To move or not to move

Andrew

Active member
The Ammonia level in my 10 gallon qt has reached .25 and I tired water changes and everything and no luck to get it down. My guess is its hight since theres 6 small fish in it for now. The ammonina is my 75 is also .25 and has been running for 4-5weeks now. Sould I move them into the 75 before the ammonia in the 10 gallon goes sky high?
 
.25 is a fatal level for most animals. A 50% water change will reduce the level by 50% and I would get on it. (maybe, keep reading)

The 75 would be a larger concern as it has been up for a month? Curious it reads the same as the 10G, what kind of test kit are you using? As noted above, .25 kills most thing or at least puts them in major distress, I have seen fish leap out of tanks that high. I really wonder if this reading is accurate...

Get an airtight container full of sample water, run down to the local fish store and have them test it... Go from there
 
Red Sea test kits. The rest of the levels check out. The fish are fine and show no signs of struggle or stress. The lfs here would use the same test kits as I do. From looking at the color chart, It looks like it's at .25
 
How old are the reagents. The indicator may begin to show a faint color as it gets old. Maybe .25 is as low as it goes. Try running a test on fresh mixed saltwater with RO or Distilled water and see if it reads negative.
 
Well not to badmouth RS kits but they are not my favorite... Lots of complaints about reading interpretaion and so I am going to venture that the reading is incorrect.

Test some tap water and some fresh saltwater and see what they read
 
.25 would be the level of dissolved ammonia and the toxic ammonia level would be 8% ( based on what the test kit info says. ) So for a total it would read as .20
 
Well... it's your kit then. Or your local water company is in violation of the Clean Water Act and is subject to fines on the order of $10,000/day.
 
Guess I should just order A salifert test kit then. I really wanted to get the fish into the 75 today since I'm not going to have time for another month.
 
Well that would be good news I suppose, I am not sure why R.Sea has so much trouble with their kits however. I suppose maybe they just ship old stuff or the stores do not move enough of it to keep fresh stock. (barring that the kits are just crap to start with)

The extra month on the tank would be beneficial IMO... The diversity of the tank will reflect the extra time you wait. If this is a fish only tank, that is a bit different but reef tanks really do benefit from as much "without fish" time as they can get. My record is 8 months and that was one of my most successful tanks to date
 
Well go buy your first fish then :)
If I might make a suggestion first... Make sure you have your stocking list figured out so that you purchase the correct fish in the correct order.

I am sure if you post your "Want" list, someone might have opins one way or the other :)
 
I already have a good idea of what I'm adding. Here's what I might add to the 75 tonight. The 10 gallon is looking bad and the water is getting pretty dirty.

1- Male True percula clown
1- Female Tomato clown ( Both clowns are buds )
4- Green chromis
1- Royal gramma


What else I'm going to add:

2- Banggai Cardinalfish

1- Regal tang ( I know but all well. Always an excuse to upgrade in the future )



Then maybe a Harlequin Tusk in the winter after all the other fish I want are in the tank.
 
even for a fish onlt tank that is a huge bio load on a 75 i just hope you have a lot of filltration
 
I'm making my own skimmer. I already have a pretty good start on it. It's going to be ran off of a sedra 5000 as the Rec. pump and a Maxi-jet 900 as the feed pump. Once I add my new sump and frag tank to the system, I'll work on an even larger on and sell the smaller one.
 
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