Ammonia problem

[sardine]

My tank was cycled. I had 2 platies living in a 10 gallon tank. I decided to get 2 more. So I now have 4 male platies living in a 10 gallon tank. They get along. My problem is that I now have high ammonia readings of 1.5 and I just did 3 water changed back to back 3 days in a row. I don't understang why the ammonia readings haven't gone down. 4 2.5 inch( and they haven't reached that size yet) in a 10 gallon tank meets the 1 inch per gallon rule so it's not an overstocked tank, it's a fully stocked tanks and after so many water changes, the first day a 50% water change and the next 2 days after a 20% water change, the ammonia should have reduced. Why hasn't it? I'm so frustrated and don't understand why this is happening. I haven't been feeding my fish at all lately because I want to wait until the ammonia drops to zero. So technically they haven't eaten since Sunday when I got the fish, that's 4 days. What should I do?

 

[sardine]

My tank was cycled. I had 2 platies living in a 10 gallon tank. I decided to get 2 more. So I now have 4 male platies living in a 10 gallon tank. They get along. My problem is that I now have high ammonia readings of 1.5 and I just did 3 water changed back to back 3 days in a row. I don't understang why the ammonia readings haven't gone down. 4 2.5 inch( and they haven't reached that size yet) in a 10 gallon tank meets the 1 inch per gallon rule so it's not an overstocked tank, it's a fully stocked tanks and after so many water changes, the first day a 50% water change and the next 2 days after a 20% water change, the ammonia should have reduced. Why hasn't it? I'm so frustrated and don't understand why this is happening. I haven't been feeding my fish at all lately because I want to wait until the ammonia drops to zero. So technically they haven't eaten since Sunday when I got the fish, that's 4 days. What should I do?

[snapback]846149[/snapback]​

Ooops, just want to clarify, I do know how to spell but when I type quickly I make a lot of typing errors and don't realize it until after I post.

 

[rdd1952]

What you have sounds like a mini cycle but it shouldn't have been that bad. You said that your tank was cycled and I'm sure that is correct but it would have only been cycled for the fish that were in it. Adding new fish would cause a mini cycle until more bacteria could develop to handle the additional waste. Having said that, just adding 2 fish shouldn't have caused your ammonia to go that high and water changes should have brought it back down. Did you do anything else recently that could have had an effect such as adding medication, pH altering chemcicals, etc? Have you checked your nitrite to see how it is running?

 

[sardine]

The nitrites are at zero. I'm testing ammonia and nitrites. The test kit better not be lying to me. I hope it's not dangerous to do this many partial water changes but the test kit keeps indicating toxic levels of ammonia so I don't know what else to do. The fish are surviving amazingly well for such toxicity. The only things I am adding to the tank are amquel water conditioner and Nitromax from Tropical Science which is bacteria in a bottle that lives in the refrigerator for 9 months.

 

[rdd1952]

The Amquel could be the problem. Although I am not familiar with Amquel as I don't use any chemicals other than dechlorinator and fertilizer, most of those products neutralize ammonia but don't actually allow the bacteria to form to process it and cycle the tank. That being the case, you would still see an ammonia reading but it would be in a non toxic form. That would explain why the fish are fine even with what appears to be a toxic level of ammonia. One other possibility is your water pH. At pH of 6.0 or lower, ammonia also takes on a non toxic form. Even at pH values of 6.2 to 6.4 ammonia is much less toxic than at a neutral pH of 7.0.