NitrItes Spike.... plus white stuff on the glass. PICS!

[Rare_Cichlids]

I switched to sand in my Jar tank a few days ago, and it seems that the filter propeller got blocked by the sand and the filter gave out yesterday night at about 11PM, i could not move the filter to clean it because it was too close to the wall, and stuck so i had to wait till today after i did a waterchange so i could move the tank foreward. ( the tank had a bubbler running all night) ..... but now i tested the water, and the NitrItes are rising, and i got white "stuff" on the glass. what can it be??? and what should i do about the NitrItes and the white stuff...??? WILL THIS HURT THE JARDINI???????????
PICS>..........

 

[AiR foRc3 wUnZ]

EW! Just get the filter running again and do at least daily 30% w/c's

 

[wataugachicken]

my thoughts on the white stuff is that it is either a tiny layer of algae that has either caught a lot of fine sand dust in it or, due to the filter stopping and lack of high nutrient flow, it has died and gotten covered with opportunistic fungus.

get on those water changes - keep ammo and 'trites under .25ppm as often as possible and your fish should be fine. it might take more than one big (50%+) change daily to do it though. if you can get some filter media from another tank to help your cycle re-establish itself, it will make things go faster.

 

[Rare_Cichlids]

well i forgot to mention that i got the filter running today, and i did over 50% water change. ...... if i get some bio-sphira on saturday will THE FISH be ok by then???

 

[wataugachicken]

they'll be fine if you keep up on the water changes, and remember that bio-spira is not a miracle product. if you have completely killed off your bio-filter, it'll still take a week at least to return to normal. bio-spira speeds up a cycle if handled properly, but there's really no guarantee that it'll work instantly. follow the directions, and do a big water change or two BEFORE adding the bio-spira. once you add it, you need to wait 24 or 48 hours (check the package) to give the bacteria a chance to anchor themselves and move out of being free-floating in the water. otherwise it'll just go down the drain. you want to make sure ammo and 'trites are as low as humanly possible before you are stuck in the no-water-change period, so that the fish are not exposed to toxic levels during that time.

 

[Snake_Eyes]

When I added bio-spira it took 1 day shy of a week to work.