Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 Hi there! I First, here is my tank’s history: Started two maybe 3 months ago with a ton of plants and fluval substrate in a 10g tank. My goal was to have a shrimp tank. First month: ammonia was at .25, nitrite 0 and nitrate at .5. I used StartSmart complete, bacter ae and I was also ghost feeding. Once I hit two months everything evened out. 0-0-0 with a ph of 6.4 (started at 6.8). I took my water to my specialty fish store (not a big box retailer) and they wondered if my tank even cycled so they sent me home with three minnows. They have been eating perfectly and two of the females became gravid. It’s been solid and stable up until now. I moved my tank to a stable shelf last week (90% of the water was removed-80% went back with a 10% water change) and now my ammonia is at .25. It has been for about a week even with my two water changes. My TDS also went from 200 to 320. I’m guessing my TDS raised because of evaporation so I won’t be using the heater in my house anymore. I only feed once every three days and I don’t feed them a whole ton either. I am wondering a few things: -do you think my tank ever cycled? -if so, do you think that having the substrate shift a bit caused this ammonia spike? -should I rehome my fish until my parameters are stable? (I am buying frtiz complete right now) -some random people are telling me that my tank crashed even though my ph is the same. My kh is low though and I have not been able to get it up. -I bought Fritz complete but it won’t be here until Monday. Do you think that will help out? I spent hundreds of hours researching how to do this properly so this is disheartening 😓 I don’t want to hurt my fish and I’m definitely not getting any shrimp until it’s stable again. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 Yes, I think your tank cycled, yes, I think the substrate shift could have caused the ammonia spike. Test and water change as needed until it settles again. Your fish should be fine, just ride it out. Do you have remineralizer? You could also consider adding some crushed coral to help stabilize your KH. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 Oof ok. Everyone is telling me different things so I feel like I’m losing my mind here. “tank crashed” “never cycled” “too many additives” “not enough additives” I have the following items… I’m pretty sure the Shrimp code elements is a remineralizer but I could be wrong! I have some cuttle fish that I use for my land snails, do you think that will help or should I specifically get crushed coral? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Widgets Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 I like your shrimp tank. I agree with @Odd Duck the tank cycled (although I question the accuracy of the 0 nitrate reading) and the move (or refill) dislodged the substrate. What is your normal water change regime? Did you do anything different with the move? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 Thank you! I love it too. After completing that tank I immediately got MTS 😅 and bought another tank. That one is empty though for now haha. I usually do a 10% water change, add dechlorinate and a little bit of bacter ae to see if I can get some biofilm growing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 On 3/19/2022 at 2:25 PM, Leashholden said: Oof ok. Everyone is telling me different things so I feel like I’m losing my mind here. “tank crashed” “never cycled” “too many additives” “not enough additives” I have the following items… I’m pretty sure the Shrimp code elements is a remineralizer but I could be wrong! I have some cuttle fish that I use for my land snails, do you think that will help or should I specifically get crushed coral? I don’t know enough about the ShrimpCode Elements to tell you and can’t find anything on line about ingredients or directions that say X pumps provide X KH per gallon. It sounds more like only very minor, trace stuff. Most remineralizers will say 1 scoop (or X pumps) per X gallons will provide X amount of KH (+/- GH if it’s a combo product). The Brightwell website isn’t responding and no one that carries it is listing anything that talks about KH or GH at all, so I suspect it is not truly a remineralizer. Oh, and I wouldn’t call it a “crash”, just a minor bump in the road. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 @Odd DuckThank you so much for all of your input! So my next steps will be: -get crushed coral to raise the KH -keep an eye on the tank to see if it stabilizes and add some fritz complete to make sure my fish are safe! Is there anything else that I’m missing? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 On 3/19/2022 at 3:00 PM, Leashholden said: @Odd DuckThank you so much for all of your input! So my next steps will be: -get crushed coral to raise the KH -keep an eye on the tank to see if it stabilizes and add some fritz complete to make sure my fish are safe! Is there anything else that I’m missing? An actual remineralizer dose would be a good step. If you have a seasoned filter, some “squeezins” from that filter will do more than any bottled bacteria to up your biofiltration capacity. There’s a lot of argument as to whether Prime or similar products actually bind the ammonia. At 0.25 ppm, I would watch like a hawk, test twice daily, and water change if it bumps to 0.5. Otherwise ride it out. You should also be aware that your water can routinely test at 0.25 ppm ammonia if your water has been treated with chloramines. That’s another reason I would ride it out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 Good to know! How much of a water change should I do if it does jump up to .5? Is 10% too little? I’m guessing you mean to just wait for everything to stabilize when you say ride it out? Sorry 😅 I want to make sure my fish are safe. I care about them a lot haha. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Widgets Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 On 3/19/2022 at 5:00 PM, Leashholden said: Good to know! How much of a water change should I do if it does jump up to .5? Is 10% too little? I’m guessing you mean to just wait for everything to stabilize when you say ride it out? Sorry 😅 I want to make sure my fish are safe. I care about them a lot haha. I would keep monitoring and dosing with Fritz Complete until your tank is done cycling. That will keep your fish safe. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 Thank you so much! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 On 3/19/2022 at 4:00 PM, Leashholden said: Good to know! How much of a water change should I do if it does jump up to .5? Is 10% too little? I’m guessing you mean to just wait for everything to stabilize when you say ride it out? Sorry 😅 I want to make sure my fish are safe. I care about them a lot haha. I would do a 50% water change to bring it back down to 0.25 ppm. And yes, that’s what I mean by ride it out. Try to not do any more than you have to until it stabilizes again. Lots of people try to chase down and fix the tiniest wobble and it doesn’t really help, plus it can make you crazy. I would consider this a small wobble that should be very manageable with minimal work and changes as long as you track it and make sure it isn’t getting worse. I would take steps to stabilize your KH since that could make you more prone to crashes. Always remember that simply feeding lightly can do wonders for letting your biofiltration catch back up with the bioload. With shrimp, since they are perfectly capable of eating only biofilm, you can easily skip feeding for several days and they’ll be just fine. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 Ok just to confirm this reading is .25 correct? Because now I’m seeing yellow and green 😭 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 19, 2022 Author Share Posted March 19, 2022 @Odd Duck Thank you for calming my nerves down. This is really solid advice. I appreciate you answering my questions! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
modified lung Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 (edited) On 3/19/2022 at 4:00 PM, Leashholden said: Ok just to confirm this reading is .25 correct? Because now I’m seeing yellow and green 😭 The kit manuals usually don't mention this but keep in mind anything between ~0.05 and 0.25 on ammonia tests look almost exactly the same to the human eye. Odd Duck gave you some good advice though. I've noticed he really knows his stuff. Edited March 19, 2022 by modified lung 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted March 19, 2022 Share Posted March 19, 2022 On 3/19/2022 at 6:00 PM, Leashholden said: Ok just to confirm this reading is .25 correct? Because now I’m seeing yellow and green 😭 Ah, I’m so glad you posted this pic. I would consider that zero ammonia. Unless I see actual green (really a yellow-green) I don’t worry about this at all. It’s almost never a true, clear, yellow like the zero color block and I should have brought it up sooner. Plus if your water is treated with chloramines, this can show up with this very low level, faint tint of green that doesn’t quite get to the color block for 0.25 ppm. I think you’re safe at this level and I wouldn’t do anything but monitor. 2 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 20, 2022 Author Share Posted March 20, 2022 Oh my god 😭 I’m so sorry for freaking out all day. I was convinced that it was green. I will keep a super close eye on it though because it used to be much more yellow two weeks ago. I appreciate you so much. With all of the various comments I thought I screwed up super hard. You are amazing!! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Odd Duck Posted March 20, 2022 Share Posted March 20, 2022 On 3/19/2022 at 7:02 PM, Leashholden said: Oh my god 😭 I’m so sorry for freaking out all day. I was convinced that it was green. I will keep a super close eye on it though because it used to be much more yellow two weeks ago. I appreciate you so much. With all of the various comments I thought I screwed up super hard. You are amazing!! We’ve all had freak out stages. Even after my literally decades of experience I’ve had some screw ups lately that were costly for a fish or two. Everybody makes mistakes, or just fails to act fast enough sometimes. We have to let ourselves be human and just keep trying to do our best. I think you’re doing just fine! 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 20, 2022 Author Share Posted March 20, 2022 That makes me feel so much better. It’s nice to know that mistakes can still happen to people who know a whole ton about this way of life! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Katherine Posted March 20, 2022 Share Posted March 20, 2022 I like to take the lid off and look down the tube when it looks borderline like that. It makes it much easier to tell if there's actually any green or not. But I agree with @Odd Duck, that looks like 0. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
isaly Posted March 20, 2022 Share Posted March 20, 2022 (edited) On 3/19/2022 at 8:43 PM, Odd Duck said: "We’ve all had freak out stages. Even after my literally decades of experience I’ve had..." I'm not speaking from much in the way of experience but I think, at first, we think our fish are oh so fragile oh NOOOOOOOOoooooooooooo..........all my fish'r gonna die....because I looked at 'em funny... Sure, there are lots of ways to kill animals by mistake. Sometimes, it's just a little of this or that special something and...poof... ...but on the whole fish are hardy creatures that would have to live in the wild. They are equipped to do so. We have to be careful because we're keeping them in glass toilets and none of the above says our fish won't get sick or hurt or that an infection won't rip through our tank and that being in a glass toilet won't exacerbate that... ...and, of course, something will now happen to test my resolve not to freak out...knock on wood *knocks on head. Edited March 20, 2022 by isaly 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leashholden Posted March 22, 2022 Author Share Posted March 22, 2022 @isaly This reply made me crack up way too hard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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