The Nightmare continues

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Fishnthehood

Fishnthehood

Candiru
MFK Member
Jan 21, 2010
839
82
46
Chino, CA
Some of you know that I recently bought a new home and have been working on completing my man cave/fish room.

To say the least it was been a frustrating ordeal. From dealing with faulty fumigators, finding a hole in the roof in my garage that wasn't there when we inspected and having to wait to fix these issues before I move my fish in.

Now ive managed to set up 3 tanks 2 10 tens and a 60 tall. I'm brought over 3 of my fry and I'm housing them
Separately in each tank. Everything was cool until last night when I got home and my tank looked like this.

I checked my water perm and found out I had a ammonia level of 5.0 when just two days before it was .25? How is this happening? I'm currently running an Ac100 On it and just feed the Little guy NLS the night prior? Help!!!!


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I believe it is a bacteria bloom. The cloudiness in the water is free floating bacteria that is reproducing rapidly in response to all of the available food (Ammonia). So what you have is normal and a healthy effect of tank cycling. As the ammonia is consumed by the bacteria the bacteria will colonize on surfaces and die back to a level balanced with the ammonia production of the inhabitants.

I would do a 25% - 50% water change to reduce the ammonia levels and flush some of the Nitrates that the ammonia consuming bacteria are producing then let nature work it's wonders.


P.S. I can't remember the last time I didn't have some sort of house project on my todo list. My philosophy is fix it right and you will only have to fix it once. That doesn't make it any less frustrating though!
 
Thanks for the feedback. I was beginning to believe my house was cursed. I'm dreading setting up my 90 gallon, 150, 135, 2 55's and my 39 in the coming months. But I'm hoping it goes well.

So the bloom would cause the ammonia to jump up that high?


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Fishnthehood said:
So the bloom would cause the ammonia to jump up that high?
Click to expand...

NO! The bloom is caused by the high levels of ammonia. The bacteria you are seeing digests the ammonia and its waste product is Nitrites. Another strain of bacteria digests the Nitrites and its waste is Nitrates. It is all a part of tank cycling.

When you set up a new tank there is no bacteria present to feed on the ammonia. The ammonia level builds up from by products of the fish. A random bacteria cell drops in to the tank out of the atmosphere. In the very nutrient (ammonia) rich water the bacteria starts reproducing at a huge rate. The bacteria consumes the Ammonia and produces Nitrite waste. Another strain of bacteria falls in out of the atmosphere and starts eating its preferred food... Nitrites. This second strain starts to multiply rapidly. Now the bacteria is so dense in the water you can actually see it as a cloud in the water.

After the first strain of bacteria eats all the available ammonia it runs out of food and dies off. After the nitrites are consumed the second strain of bacteria also dies off. BUT because there are fish producing new limited quantities of Ammonia some of the bacteria continues to live on (in a much smaller population). The amount of bacteria that continues to live on is limited by the amount of new ammonia introduced into the system. The amount of ammonia introduced into the system is determined by how many fish you have and how much you feed them.

You can jump start this process by seeding the tank with bacteria from an existing tank. The most common way to do this is by moving filter media from an old tank that has established colonies of bacteria to the new tank. This way the ammonia levels don't build up waiting for the random bacterial cells to fall into the tank.

The end result of all of this is Nitrates. Nitrates are not nearly as poisonous to the fish as Ammonia and nitrites... but they can be poisonous in large quantities. So you will need to rid your tank of nitrates. You can do this with: 1) Water changes 2) Nitrate reactors 3) Plants 4) algae 5) chemical filtration.
 
Oughtsix said:
NO! The bloom is caused by the high levels of ammonia. The bacteria you are seeing digests the ammonia and its waste product is Nitrites. Another strain of bacteria digests the Nitrites and its waste is Nitrates. It is all a part of tank cycling.

When you set up a new tank there is no bacteria present to feed on the ammonia. The ammonia level builds up from by products of the fish. A random bacteria cell drops in to the tank out of the atmosphere. In the very nutrient (ammonia) rich water the bacteria starts reproducing at a huge rate. The bacteria consumes the Ammonia and produces Nitrite waste. Another strain of bacteria falls in out of the atmosphere and starts eating its preferred food... Nitrites. This second strain starts to multiply rapidly. Now the bacteria is so dense in the water you can actually see it as a cloud in the water.

After the first strain of bacteria eats all the available ammonia it runs out of food and dies off. After the nitrites are consumed the second strain of bacteria also dies off. BUT because there are fish producing new limited quantities of Ammonia some of the bacteria continues to live on (in a much smaller population). The amount of bacteria that continues to live on is limited by the amount of new ammonia introduced into the system. The amount of ammonia introduced into the system is determined by how many fish you have and how much you feed them.

You can jump start this process by seeding the tank with bacteria from an existing tank. The most common way to do this is by moving filter media from an old tank that has established colonies of bacteria to the new tank. This way the ammonia levels don't build up waiting for the random bacterial cells to fall into the tank.

The end result of all of this is Nitrates. Nitrates are not nearly as poisonous to the fish as Ammonia and nitrites... but they can be poisonous in large quantities. So you will need to rid your tank of nitrates. You can do this with: 1) Water changes 2) Nitrate reactors 3) Plants 4) algae 5) chemical filtration.
Click to expand...

+1

U cant have nitrates before nitrites. 2 types off bb

#1 S. Vettel
 
I've seen this before. Looks like green water. Hit it with a UV sterilizer and it will be gone in a day or two.
 
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