Ammonia level won’t go down. Please help

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

I learned about ammolock on this forum. I will continue to do daily water changes. Add one conditioner and nothing else. Is 75% appropriate? The Only reason I am doing in fish Cycle, is because I purchased fish from Petsmart, and when I did, they never mentioned a cycle to me. After losing three fish, I started my own research, and learned about the cycle process. It was too late then to do a no fish cycle since I still had fish left

Yup...we're now committed to a Fish-in cycle.
The daily water changes are good, but don't be afraid to do as many as it takes to keep the ammonia level down. 75% is fine.
(I notice still that too many on-line fishkeepers fret about changing the water so drastically, even in emergency situations such as this. They are all misinformed and, I believe, hung over from some of the bad practices of The Olden Days. I go back to mentioning the constant water changes in the natural environment, including those imposed by heavy rainfalls).
Just the one conditioner is also good.

Hopefully, you should be able to save some, if not all, of your remaining fish.

 

[Tenaj]

Yup...we're now committed to a Fish-in cycle.
The daily water changes are good, but don't be afraid to do as many as it takes to keep the ammonia level down. 75% is fine.
(I notice still that too many on-line fishkeepers fret about changing the water so drastically, even in emergency situations such as this. They are all misinformed and, I believe, hung over from some of the bad practices of The Olden Days. I go back to mentioning the constant water changes in the natural environment, including those imposed by heavy rainfalls).
Just the one conditioner is also good.

Hopefully, you should be able to save some, if not all, of your remaining fish.

Thank you. Just tested ammonia. Still
High. All fish are still alive this morning. Going to start my 75% water change now. I feel so bad for them. The water doesn’t smell but very cloudy. Hard to see all fish. I had to go finding them all. And they are all neon colors too

 

[Tenaj]

How old are your test reagents?

7/2026 is what it shows.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Thank you. Just tested ammonia. Still
High. All fish are still alive this morning. Going to start my 75% water change now. I feel so bad for them. The water doesn’t smell but very cloudy. Hard to see all fish. I had to go finding them all. And they are all neon colors too

The 'cloudy' is probably bacteria. Don't worry about this, just keep changing the water and NEVER forget to use conditioner.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

The filter which I replaced 2 weeks ago, was so gooky. It was slimy looking as if it hadn’t been changed. It does appear to be flowing well and not slowed down. I replaced the filter and made sure there was no blockage.

What kind of filter do you have? The majority of the beneficial bacteria will be living within your filter so completely replacing parts of it is removing the bacteria you need.

Depending on the filter and what is in it you can get away with replacing filter floss and even foam pads if you have lots of bio friendly media in there but generally you would only replace filter floss and everything else you just wash out in the tank water (that you take out to do a water change).

If you rinse them under tap water the chlorine etc in it will kill whatever bacteria you have in there. Normally it's best to drain out a bucket of water from your tank and clean your filter bits off in that.

 

[Slaphppy7]

What kind of filter do you have? The majority of the beneficial bacteria will be living within your filter so completely replacing parts of it is removing the bacteria you need.

Depending on the filter and what is in it you can get away with replacing filter floss and even foam pads if you have lots of bio friendly media in there but generally you would only replace filter floss and everything else you just wash out in the tank water (that you take out to do a water change).

If you rinse them under tap water the chlorine etc in it will kill whatever bacteria you have in there. Normally it's best to drain out a bucket of water from your tank and clean your filter bits off in that.

^^ This ^^

When doing a fish-in cycle, NEVER clean or replace anything concerning filtration.

The beneficial bacteria you are trying to grow will mainly colonize in your filter, on the filter media and the filter surfaces. Later, as the tank matures, the BB colony will establish in other parts of the tank, but for now, the filter and it's media are the lifeblood of the tank, when it comes to detoxifying ammonia.

NEVER clean the filter media in anything but old tank water during a WC, and BE CERTAIN that the media never dries out when doing WC's or at any other time...dry media = dead BB

No clue why you were using 2 conditioners, stop doing that, as advised above, and get rid of the ammolock stuff....the more chemicals in a tank, the more we complicate things

Use the Prime, WC's daily as necessary, check ammonia 24H AFTER a WC

For all intents and purposes, IMO, you are just beginning the fish-in cycle...follow the directions in the fish-in sticky link as closely as possible.

 

[Tenaj]

Thank you. Just tested ammonia. Still
High. All fish are still alive this morning. Going to start my 75% water change now. I feel so bad for them. The water doesn’t smell but very cloudy. Hard to see all fish. I had to go finding them all. And they are all neon colors too

^^ This ^^

When doing a fish-in cycle, NEVER clean or replace anything concerning filtration.

The beneficial bacteria you are trying to grow will mainly colonize in your filter, on the filter media and the filter surfaces. Later, as the tank matures, the BB colony will establish in other parts of the tank, but for now, the filter and it's media are the lifeblood of the tank, when it comes to detoxifying ammonia.

NEVER clean the filter media in anything but old tank water during a WC, and BE CERTAIN that the media never dries out when doing WC's or at any other time...dry media = dead BB

No clue why you were using 2 conditioners, stop doing that, as advised above, and get rid of the ammolock stuff....the more chemicals in a tank, the more we complicate things

Use the Prime, WC's daily as necessary, check ammonia 24H AFTER a WC

For all intents and purposes, IMO, you are just beginning the fish-in cycle...follow the directions in the fish-in sticky link as closely as possible.

Just completed a 75% water change and tested water. Will be doing another one this Evening. Ammonia dropped a little. Water looks a little clearer. Fish are not at top of tank. Added pics of a before change after change and ammonia. Only put recommended amount of water conditioner and nothing else.

 

[Bruce Leyland-Jones]

Just completed a 75% water change and tested water. Will be doing another one this Evening. Ammonia dropped a little. Water looks a little clearer. Fish are not at top of tank. Added pics of a before change after change and ammonia. Only put recommended amount of water conditioner and nothing else.

That sounds better. Keep up with the water changes.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Just completed a 75% water change and tested water. Will be doing another one this Evening. Ammonia dropped a little. Water looks a little clearer. Fish are not at top of tank. Added pics of a before change after change and ammonia. Only put recommended amount of water conditioner and nothing else.

Great job. Its going to be a pain for quite awhile and a couple of large water changes a day are on the cards. If you can keep up with it though you will hopefully pull through ok.

Don't worry too much about cloudy water. It is pretty common during the cycling process. The water changes will clear most of it and it will burn itself out eventually too.

 

[Tenaj]

Great job. Its going to be a pain for quite awhile and a couple of large water changes a day are on the cards. If you can keep up with it though you will hopefully pull through ok.

Don't worry too much about cloudy water. It is pretty common during the cycling process. The water changes will clear most of it and it will burn itself out eventually too.

Thank you. I thought I was doing the right thing and somehow screwed something up. Now I am backtracking my only real concern is making sure those babies are healthy and happy. I will master this lol

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Thank you. I thought I was doing the right thing and somehow screwed something up. Now I am backtracking my only real concern is making sure those babies are healthy and happy. I will master this lol

To be fair you were doing what you thought was right. When you found out it wasn't you took what steps were necessary to correct it. Your doing a good job and with that kind of attitude you will probably get on pretty well with fish keeping in the future.

Fish keeping unfortunately still has a lot of bad information out there. Especially from some Fish shops that are often the first and sometimes last point of knowledge most people have. It's even worse when you have some fish shops that are incentivised to upsale addition products (like ammonia locking chemicals, etc). I have know so many people that have replied with variations of "oh yeah I had fish for awhile but they didn't live very long" and they just didn't have a clue why. They followed the advise the fish shop gave them and it all went wrong. It's not really their fault.

Thankfully with the internet nowadays things aren't quite so bad but there is still a lot of conflicting information out there so don't feel bad if it all seems a bit confusing and contradictory at first.

 

[Tenaj]

To be fair you were doing what you thought was right. When you found out it wasn't you took what steps were necessary to correct it. Your doing a good job and with that kind of attitude you will probably get on pretty well with fish keeping in the future.

Fish keeping unfortunately still has a lot of bad information out there. Especially from some Fish shops that are often the first and sometimes last point of knowledge most people have. It's even worse when you have some fish shops that are incentivised to upsale addition products (like ammonia locking chemicals, etc). I have know so many people that have replied with variations of "oh yeah I had fish for awhile but they didn't live very long" and they just didn't have a clue why. They followed the advise the fish shop gave them and it all went wrong. It's not really their fault.

Thankfully with the internet nowadays things aren't quite so bad but there is still a lot of conflicting information out there so don't feel bad if it all seems a bit confusing and contradictory at first.

I wish I had been told about cycling, before selling me the fish and sending me on my way. I had to learn, after killing a few fish. That is also why I upgraded from a 10 gallon, to a 36. I agree, thankfully there are forums like this one, people like you, and google to search on

 

[Tenaj]

2nd water change today. 75% and just finished a 50%. Ammonia level is going down. Thankfully!! Will test again tonight. Water changes tomorrow!!

 

[Tenaj]

I’ve been working with an ammonia level spike for almost 2 days now. Did 2 water changes yesterday and level was still at 8ppms this morning. Today I did 2 changes. One was 75% the other was amost 50%. Fish are not acting weird today. Yesterday they were gasping for air. The ammonia level is now between 4 and 2 ppms How would I know if my fish have ammonia poisoning? They are all acting normal but with the ammonia level spiking since yesterday morning, I want to know what to look for. I have not fed them since yesterday morning. Nitrite is reading at .25. I am aware I’m not at a complete cycle and will continue the daily water changes until I get all levels down. My concern is knowing if my fish have poisoning and if I can feed them. Please help

 

[Rocky998]

I’ve been working with an ammonia level spike for almost 2 days now. Did 2 water changes yesterday and level was still at 8ppms this morning. Today I did 2 changes. One was 75% the other was amost 50%. Fish are not acting weird today. Yesterday they were gasping for air. The ammonia level is now between 4 and 2 ppms How would I know if my fish have ammonia poisoning? They are all acting normal but with the ammonia level spiking since yesterday morning, I want to know what to look for. I have not fed them since yesterday morning. Nitrite is reading at .25. I am aware I’m not at a complete cycle and will continue the daily water changes until I get all levels down. My concern is knowing if my fish have poisoning and if I can feed them. Please help

If the fish are gasping, that can be a sign of ammonia poisoning. Was the tank already cycled?