FishProfiles.com Message Forums

I just moved and setup a tank. It sat for a week and then I got some fish planning a light stocking to do a light cycle. Tested the water shortly after getting fish and 2ppm ammonia... where'd that come from? Tested the tapwater and it start at 1-2ppm ammonia and 5nitrate. oh great.... Change water, add double dose of prime, change water, add double dose of prime, change water... 4ppm ammonia. Pickup grocery store filtered refillable water. Still has ammonia. Nitrites went flying off the chart. Change water, add zeolite, change water, add double dose of prime, order purigen, change water... still can't test nitrites and now nitrates are off the chart. 75% water change and nitrates are barely below the highest level on the kit and nitrites are still off the chart. A small scale test showed I needed another 75% dilution to bring nitrites on to the chart. More water change... 2, 75% changes in the same day. Added purigen. Running out of prime. Added a terrestrial plant to the HOB refugium. More zeolite. I'm letting stuff circulate and then I'm doing tests. :/

We need a whole house filter as soon as we have money again. Glad I haven't been drinking that stuff. For now I'm going to have to setup tanks with plants and run them until I get numbers under control before thinking of adding fish. It puts all tank plans on hold until I can afford everything needed to make each tank healthy.

Hi,
Your problem water may be due to all the farming out there. Fertilizers will percolate through the ground into the ground water. That could be the cause of the high Nitrate and Ammonia readings.

I live at 10,000' in the Colorado Rockies in south Park County. Our water comes through an aquifer of fractured granite and other igneous rocks. We have radon in the water and some heavy metals. The house plumbing is all copper. We purchased a Penguin Whole House Charcoal Filter, with the filtering system ( 3 fiber filters in series), not yet installed. When I first tried to set up a tank, I added some MTS snails, and a couple of live bearers. The snails died as soon as they opened up, and the fish a couple of days later. A copper test revealed a copper reading of .25. I purchased the PUR charcoal filter for the kitchen sink and tested the water after its installation. There was no reading for copper or other heavy metals.

If you have a well, I would urge you to get it tested.
If you don't have a well check with the company that supplies your water and ask for a breakdown of the water chemistry explaining that you want to keep tropical fish and the readings you are getting with your testing.

They should be able to help.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

My purigen nearly maxed out in 48hrs and it was an amount for a 55g in a 40g tank. I let tapwater with a little tank water for bacteria sit overnight and the ammonia goes up. The more water I change the worse things get. Straight tapwater is not useable. I got some filtered $.39 per gallon water from the store and mixed it with some water run through a single tap filter we bought for the chinchillas. I'm only running 10g until I figure out what works so I'm not changing 40gallons a day.