[MissBec]

I have 4 fish at the moment in 120 litre tank. I have been cycling my tank with fishes. 4 days ago every spike for 2 days and went back to zero but nitrite didn't spile but it was still 10ppm and ammonia was dark blue? could it still cycle if i had high reading of ammonia?

I used API - freshwater kit

 

[sprmankalel]

You can get mini cycles even after your cycle has been complete. They can be caused by a large cleaning of your tank and filter or adding more fish. The bacteria will grow enough to handle the bioload of your tank and adding more fish increases that bioload and could cause a mini cycle.

Suggestion: test everything again. I have successfully tested nitrAtes at 0 ad then at 20 immediately following. There can be human error. With nitrIte there is only one solution but I still usually test twice.

 

[MissBec]

Sorry I meant nitrate didn't spike but nitrite did, it's been like this for 4 days of the ammonia... Could of my tank cycled? I have done 2 large water changed and gravel vacuum clean but no change of ammonia what should I do?

Is my kit faulty or my tank is bad. Ph: 6.6 I have been adding ammonia lock very two days
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[sprmankalel]

Take a sample to your local fish store. Even PetCo and PetSmart do tests. Granted, they use stirrups but not all that inaccurate. Yay ammonia, nitrite and nitrate again and post the results.
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[Cspencer83]

Just to make sure with the Nitrates tester you are putting in your test 1 then capping it making sure its mixed for a few sec then shaking test 2s bottle for 30 sec then adding that and shaking it for one min right?

Another question is and maybe the kits differ with the colors but how did you get dark blue, my Ammonia goes from yellow to green, Nitrites go from light blue to purple and nitrates go fro myellow to orange to red to a really dark almost brown red

 

[SeaHorse]

RE TEST. Something got mixed up. That blue one doesn't make sense. Blue is a reading on the PH chart. Ammonia should get really dark green.
YES shake those bottles for a long time before using them. Also be sure to turn the test solution bottles completely upside down to get uniform drops each time.
Retest and let us know what you get. :lol:

 

[MissBec]

I went to the shop and my test kit wasn't faulty my ammonia was off the charts the guy said it was at least 20ppm, I have done numerous water changes and today it has gone down to 8ppm woop!! Still got more water changes too, no fishes have died yet thank god for that!!

 

[Cspencer83]

The bad news is that the exposure probibly did its damage, I have a fish that recently died yesterday out of no where that i think was from the exposure, and another came down with a swim bladder disorder and is getting worse even though i have tried to make it better with peas I am hoping for no more problems but you never know with the fish i had when my ammonia spiked hard

 

[MissBec]

What should I watch out for? I did remove all lot of pebbles out of my tank as i realized i had too much in there which I believe it was trapping all the waste. Also i saw in pet shops sell worm/parasite tablets is it necessary to treat a fish? on regularly bases

I have been adding AAPI - ammonia lock and API Stress Zyme

 

[Cspencer83]

I don't think that there is anything that you can do really I mean you might get lucky and your fish won't have any negative. 2 out of my 5 original fish had problems and I hope that since they both got hit with life threatening things at around the same time that is all that is going to happen. To me its like a ticking time bomb, it could strike at any time you just have to hope that when it does your fish are resilient enough to survive with minimal to no damage. But in cases like my female silver molly where she is just floating sideways now around the top of the tank. Shes alive but has a stressful time trying to even eat.

 

[SeaHorse]

I think you may be missing a point here. The fish poop that creates the high numbers of Ammonia eventually gets consumed by the bacteria and they grow on all surfaces. That's gravel, rocks, pebbles, plastic plants, filter parts, all surfaces. You should not be removing or cleaning any of these until you are well thru the full cycle and even then the tank needs to "mature". I personally would not gravel vac AT ALL until my tank is well established or if you do, do so sparingly.
Have you tested your source water to see what is in it? I have .25ppm in my tap water so I use Prime as it neutralizes everything. The ammonia lock is probably what is keeping your fish safe but it still gives you positive numbers I believe since it is still present. Does that make sense?
When the store tested the Ammonia was it dark green??

 

[MissBec]

I'm not sure if I scared my Molly but he was swimming like spatic he did this yesterday as well then he sunk to the bottom of the tank which I thought he was died, he has been swimming around but today he keeps hanging at the bottom of tank? What wrong with him? Could it be from the ammonia?

 

[LittleBlueFishlets]

1) What's the current ammonia reading in the tank?

2) How often do you do water changes? What percentage of the water do you change each time?

3) What's the current pH in the tank?

A lower pH will favor ammonium (NH4+), which is MUCH less toxic to fish than ammonia (NH3). However, most common testing kits don't differentiate between ammonia and ammonium. (Ie: you'll get a positive result for either/both.)

Here is an excellent article that might be helpful to you: Ammonia in Aquatic Systems