New Betta Tank Issues

[Teddy Kagel]

Hello all!

My name is Teddy I have recently started a new Betta tank (my first aquarium!). I set everything up. Hard scaped with Spectrastone gravel, WonderStone, Granite, and Malaysian Driftwood. I then added plants, filled it up, and added Aqueon water conditioner. I let this tank cycle for a day and then added Multi-purpose StartSmart Complete to start a bacteria culture, Seachem Flourish, and Seachem Flourish Iron. I then added my Betta and tested the water with the API water testing kit. Everything was normal and in a good range except for ammonia. I'm already up at 1ppm and I'm wondering if this is dangerous. If so should I do a water change or buy some ammo lock? Or should I wait a day to see what happens? I should also mention that I tested my tap water that I used and it came up as 0ppm.

Thank you!

[Eddie Dingle]

I would do daily testing and stay on top of water changes, it can take a few weeks before your aquarium can keep ammomia and nitrites at 0 ppm. Don't over feed your betta and you should be able to get through ammonia spikes until your aquarium is fully cycled. 

[Eddie Dingle]

I would recommend a water change to add to what I said above. 

[Patrick_G]

I would do water changes frequently over the next two weeks until your ammonia and nitrite levels reach 0. 

[quikv6]

1ppm of ammonia can certain stress/harm the fish. Water changes would be plan A, but if that's not feasible, a good plan B would be to detoxify the ammonia w/Seachem Prime. (as opposed to ammo lock, though same idea)

[Goosedub]

Ammo lock will just stunt your bacterial growth and probably mess with your testing parameters. For me, I don’t like anything above 0.5 ppm ammonia to start. If it were me, I would feed very lightly and test every 1-2 days and change water if it’s 0.5-1.0 ppm or above until your parameters stabilize. 
 

you have to balance the stressors for your fish. Ammonia is a stressor, too little food is a stressor, and water changes are a stressor, so it is a delicate balance. I’m currently fighting ammonia in my new betta tank as well. They are tough fish and can handle a little stress.

If you just can’t balance the ammonia, you CAN fast the fish for a day or 2 to get on top of it. 
 

Good luck!

[Schwack]

You'll likely benefit from doing a bit of reading on the nitrogen cycle (https://fishlab.com/fish-in-cycle/). Your tank wasn't ready for fish, but fish-in cycle isn't the end of the world. You can dose the tank with something like Seachem Prime which converts ammonia to ammonium, a much less harmful chemical, for 24 hours or so, but you'll be doing that for several weeks.

Long story short, it takes quite a while for beneficial bacteria to grow in your tank to convert ammonia to nitrite and nitrite to nitrate. You then remove nitrate through water changes or plant uptake. 

In your position, I'd dial back to feeding lightly once every other day. Make sure you're not overfeeding during this time. Your fish should be able to eat everything you give him. If you're feeding betta pellets it's easy to make sure he eats everything you put in the tank.

Keep an eye on your water parameters and consider a water change when ammonia starts to creep into the 1ppm range or nitrite hits .5ppm. Both of these can be harmful to fish, but bettas are pretty tough. You'll be doing this for... a while, probably 3-4 weeks.

You're not the first person to end up in this spot, and it's not a difficult problem to solve, but it is kind of a pain. Just keep an eye on your parameters, and your fish's behavior, do water changes when necessary and wait for ammonia/nitrite to consistently read 0. Once they're both 0'd out each day, you'll be able to sit back and let your tank do most of the work. Water changes from then on can be scheduled around keeping nitrates in a reasonable range.

Good luck!