Newbie:Ammonia levels and Water Change

[vinodhv]

Does a PWC affect ammonia levels? I just added some fish to my tank and think i need to do one, since its been over a week. my ammonia level increased in the past two days.

 

[Balloon Fish]

what is a PWC? my guess is P water change but i dont know what the P stands for. You shouldn't have any ammonia in your tank if you cycled it.

 

[vinodhv]

thats the thing, i didnt have any ammonia in it. i checked it at home and at 2 pet stores.

 

[Lotus]

The ammonia is coming from the fish, not the water change, unless you have chloramines in your water and aren't neutralizing it correctly. Do a test by putting some tapwater in a cup, adding your dechlorinator, then test it for ammonia.

How did you cycle it?

 

[vinodhv]

hey there, a friend had the tank set up with goldfish for a few months and it was cycled. I checked the water before converting to tropical fish.
I added the conditioner to the tap water and there's ammonia in it.should i get one of those deammonianizing chemicals they have at the pet store?

 

[FroggyFox]

Oh bummer...

No I wouldn't add anything to the tank, they'll usually just cause more issues and cost money. Just do some extra water changes to help your fish out a bit while your tank cycles.

Do you have a nitrate and nitrite test kits? I would assume that unless you let everything dry out or rinsed it all with chlorinated water that you still have to have SOME bacteria there. If you have those two kits and any measurement of those, then hopefully you'll cycle pretty quick.

I wouldn't add anymore fish until your ammonia and nitrites are back down to 0.

 

[vinodhv]

hey, i'm definitely not adding any other fish. I'm going to do a water change in 10 minutes and maybe do 10% everyday. does that sound good or is that overkill?

 

[LongTime]

what is a PWC? my guess is P water change but i dont know what the P stands for. You shouldn't have any ammonia in your tank if you cycled it.

P=Partial?

 

[FroggyFox]

Oh yeah sorry...PWC is partial water change.

I think 10% every day or every other day should be fine. You want to do enough to give your fish some relief from high levels of ammonia/nitrite....but not too much or it'll take forever for your tank to cycle.

how about those nitrite/nitrate test kits?

 

[Balloon Fish]

oooo ok never seen people say PWC before :/ maybe they have but i musta missed it all

 

[Lotus]

So you're saying that when you added the dechlorinator to the tapwater, there's ammonia in that?

If so, you need to get a water conditioner that both breaks the chlorine/ammonia bond in chloramine and also detoxifies the ammonia.

Note that some ammonia tests will still show ammonia even though it has been detoxified. This is because the ammonia hasn't been removed, but has been converted into a form that isn't toxic to fish.