About a week and a half ago I was cleaning my tank. Before I begand cleaning my ammonia levels and PH were right where they need to be. I vacumed the gravel and cleaned the filter because it had been about 3 or 4 months since I last cleaned it(Aquaclear 500, two sponges). I removed the sponges and cleaned them in old tank water. Refilled the tank with new dechlorinated water. Left the tank over night. The next day I noticed a fish with Ick, bought some Ick treatment. After finishing the 5th and final day of the treatment my water began to becoming increasinly cloudy. I checked the ammonia and it was sky high 8ppm. I dont know why my fish arnt dead yet. Today the tank is so cloudy I cant see the back of it. It's almost like a white cloud, you can kinda see it rolling with the current from the filter. Any ideas? I was thiniking I may have cleaned my filter sponges and gravel too much, not leaving enough beneficial bacteria, I have trouble thinking this is possible. Maybe I got rid of too much bacteria and the Ick treatment finished it off. I've done everythign I know to do. Oh yeah sorry I forgot, it's a 75g and I've been doing partial water changes frequently, almost every day. 30%, 40%. The water clears up a bit and ammonia drops just to rise the high levels and cloudiness again the next day. Any help you can give me will be greatly appreciated. Thanks
I've got a water problem
- Thread starter brwn234
- Start date
Certain meds can have a negative effect on your bio-filter. And if you had just cleaned it very well to begin with, the meds you used for you ich treatment may have killed off the rest of your bio-filter. The cloudiness sounds like you are going thru a min-cycle right now.
i would keep up the water changes daily til Ammonia and Nitrites are under control. if the tank is well stocked - and you can find a LFS with that new Bio-Spira you may want to give that a try to help reestablish your bio filter
i would keep up the water changes daily til Ammonia and Nitrites are under control. if the tank is well stocked - and you can find a LFS with that new Bio-Spira you may want to give that a try to help reestablish your bio filter
I'm wondering how I should clean the sponges. Should I just rinse them off and remove the large particles of waste? Or should I be squeezing them thorougly? I figure that squeezing them would remove good bacteria.
You won't remove all the good bacteria by squeezing them. However, if you have the 2 sponges anyway, quickly swish one to get out the worst and put it on bottom. Thoroughly clean the other (squeeze, twist, smush, etc.), use it for the top sponge. Next time, rotate the top one down and thoroughly clean only the old bottom one. At least, that's what I do, everybody has different routines. I would clean more often than once every 3-4 months too, but that also depends on what is necessary for your tank, bioload, etc. (I do mine weekly, I'm a bit overstocked).
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How do I get back to where I was? Good water. Should I just continue the water changes and leave everything else alone?
You should use ammo-lock (or equiv.) in conjunction with your water changes to reduce stress on your fish. I believe Wetman previously posted on another thread that the ammonia bound by ammo-lock is still available to feed bacteria while your biofilter is re-starting. If this isn't correct, somebody please correct me.
I was going on this product description at Aquarium Pharmaceuticals' site: "Locks up ammonia in a non-toxic form until it can be broken down by the tank's natural biological filter." --works fer me! Kordon always gives you more thorough information on their dry goods... I'm convinced AmQuel works similarly.
"Hwaet!" Solisten! --as we begin in New York...
So, where did all this ammonia come from, anyway? Organics breaking down, I'm sure. (No additional critters in the system, right?) I think deep stirring of the substrate at long intervals is a terrible practice. Can't go into it all, but just imagine the hecatombs of aerobic bacteria now deprived of oxygen, and the anaerobic bacteria now burned by it as those highly ordered substrate layers are all ground together in the maelstrom, and all that un-biodegraded detritus now stirred down into those lower layers so soon to become anoxic again...
And the cloudiness following a medication for a ciliate? "After finishing the 5th and final day of the treatment my water began to becoming increasinly cloudy. I checked the ammonia and it was sky high 8ppm. I dont know why my fish arnt dead yet. Today the tank is so cloudy I cant see the back of it. It's almost like a white cloud, you can kinda see it rolling with the current from the filter. Any ideas?"
Yes! You bet! brwn234, you decimated the good ciliates along with the one bad one. And the rotifers. And the other members of the zooplankton. Now that things are getting back on track, a gallon of crystal clear water from a planted tank that hasn't recently been medicated will return a founder population of water-clearing plankton... trust the wetman. I wish I could mail you a healing pint of plankton.
There are many reasons to keep the filters clean: bacteria are mineralizing phosphates to forms algae can use. Breakdown of organics is producing ammonia and various organic acids. The acids are eating at the carbonate buffer and would depress the pH if the buffer weren't pretty strong. yada yada yada.
Clean those filters brwn234! You bad! Until things are sparkling again, clean the filters at least every week. Squish em and squash em: you won't dislodge the bacteria. And use the brown water to feed your houseplants.
"Hwaet!" Solisten! --as we begin in New York...
So, where did all this ammonia come from, anyway? Organics breaking down, I'm sure. (No additional critters in the system, right?) I think deep stirring of the substrate at long intervals is a terrible practice. Can't go into it all, but just imagine the hecatombs of aerobic bacteria now deprived of oxygen, and the anaerobic bacteria now burned by it as those highly ordered substrate layers are all ground together in the maelstrom, and all that un-biodegraded detritus now stirred down into those lower layers so soon to become anoxic again...
And the cloudiness following a medication for a ciliate? "After finishing the 5th and final day of the treatment my water began to becoming increasinly cloudy. I checked the ammonia and it was sky high 8ppm. I dont know why my fish arnt dead yet. Today the tank is so cloudy I cant see the back of it. It's almost like a white cloud, you can kinda see it rolling with the current from the filter. Any ideas?"
Yes! You bet! brwn234, you decimated the good ciliates along with the one bad one. And the rotifers. And the other members of the zooplankton. Now that things are getting back on track, a gallon of crystal clear water from a planted tank that hasn't recently been medicated will return a founder population of water-clearing plankton... trust the wetman. I wish I could mail you a healing pint of plankton.
There are many reasons to keep the filters clean: bacteria are mineralizing phosphates to forms algae can use. Breakdown of organics is producing ammonia and various organic acids. The acids are eating at the carbonate buffer and would depress the pH if the buffer weren't pretty strong. yada yada yada.
Clean those filters brwn234! You bad! Until things are sparkling again, clean the filters at least every week. Squish em and squash em: you won't dislodge the bacteria. And use the brown water to feed your houseplants.