Jorge54 Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 Can someone help me please. My tank had a very high ammonia spike reaching at 4.0. I have done 50% water change for the last 5 days with no feeding. It has drop down to 1ppm. All my fish are still alive and well. My only concern is that they have been off with out food and I'm afraid they will die. It is a 60 gallon tank. 8 juili cory, 5 pleco and 4 Molly. My question is should I keep doing the water changes with out feeding until 0 ammonia is shown? Or is there anyother suggestions ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lefty o Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 fish can go a very long time without food, so not to worry unless there are very young fry. how are you testing for ammonia, and what water conditioner are you using if any? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David W Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 Jorge, how long has your tank been up and running. Are you new to fish keeping? Have you changed filter media or made any other changes that may have crashed your cycle? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jorge54 Posted December 22, 2020 Author Share Posted December 22, 2020 (edited) 41 minutes ago, David W said: Jorge, how long has your tank been up and running. Are you new to fish keeping? Have you changed filter media or made any other changes that may have crashed your cycle? Yes im about a month new to this. I have not done any filter media change. The tank is about 3 weeks old. Edited December 22, 2020 by Jorge54 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jorge54 Posted December 22, 2020 Author Share Posted December 22, 2020 44 minutes ago, lefty o said: fish can go a very long time without food, so not to worry unless there are very young fry. how are you testing for ammonia, and what water conditioner are you using if any? I been using the API testing kit. And been using the API tap water conditioner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David W Posted December 22, 2020 Share Posted December 22, 2020 Welcome to fish keeping. If you are not familiar with the nitrogen cycle here is a really good place to start. Your Tank needs to build up beneficial bacteria in order to process the the ammonia. There are some products to help get this going, some seem to work better than others. I have not had luck with API's version, but Tetra Safe start seemed to work. The biggest factor is time. Try to feed lightly and keep testing and keep up with water changes. First tanks always seem hard, but like anything else it gets easier with some practice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jorge54 Posted December 22, 2020 Author Share Posted December 22, 2020 1 hour ago, David W said: Welcome to fish keeping. If you are not familiar with the nitrogen cycle here is a really good place to start. Your Tank needs to build up beneficial bacteria in order to process the the ammonia. There are some products to help get this going, some seem to work better than others. I have not had luck with API's version, but Tetra Safe start seemed to work. The biggest factor is time. Try to feed lightly and keep testing and keep up with water changes. First tanks always seem hard, but like anything else it gets easier with some practice. Ok i will try that thank you for the help ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JettsPapa Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 I'd go ahead and start feeding lightly, but also keep testing your water daily and do water changes as needed to keep your combined ammonia and nitrites ideally below 0.5 ppm, but definitely below 1.0 ppm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jorge54 Posted December 23, 2020 Author Share Posted December 23, 2020 3 hours ago, JettsPapa said: I'd go ahead and start feeding lightly, but also keep testing your water daily and do water changes as needed to keep your combined ammonia and nitrites ideally below 0.5 ppm, but definitely below 1.0 ppm. I did another water change tonight and before I tested the water and it went up! Should I start feeding light and hope to let the bacteria grow and doing water changes everyday ? . I'm currently using Fluval biological booster. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quikv6 Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 I think it's a good idea to detoxify that ammonia (Seachem Prime is a popular product, but there are similar out there.) That should neutralize it for 24-48 hours. I would also add a product like Fritzyme 7, which contains nitrifying bacteria. I had good luck with it speeding up my cycle to completion. Keep testing as well. Frequent small waterchanges are helpful as well. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy's Fish Den Posted December 23, 2020 Share Posted December 23, 2020 Have you tested the water you're using for the water changes? You said the tank is three weeks old, it is more than likely still going through it's cycle. Even if you cycled the tank when you set it up, every time you add fish, the tank needs to build up the beneficial bacteria to process the waste from those fish, so if you added all the fish at once or even a few days apart the tank needs to build up the BB, and being that the tank is so new, it will take longer than one that is well established. If you can get hold of some Fritz zyme 7 you can add that in the tank to help boost the bacteria to process everything. You can feed light, keep watching the ammonia levels, do a 25-30% water change if it goes over 1.0 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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