One Good Tank, One Bad Tank

[Ani]

I need some guidance on a water quality problem i've got. We've had a small 40 litre tank running for 3 months. After the first month, we added six red eye tetras to help the cycling and all was well. Then we had problems with an ancistrus fighting one of our plecs in our large 90 gallon tank so we move the ancistrus to the small tank with the red eyes. All was well and peaceful. Then we made a bad mistake. We added 6 platys and three fighters (one male, two females) to the small tank and overwhelmed our new filter and bacteria colony. I do daily water checks so noticed within 48 hours and prompty moved the 6 platys into our larger 90 gallon tank where they are living a happy life. This was about 1 month ago. Since then I have not been able to stabalise the cycle. We've not added any more fish but the water is still cloudy and smelly.

The tank is planted, and it has bogwood and rocks. We've got gravel and sand. I've treated the water with an Ammonia remover which solves the problem in the short-term but makes little difference in the long-run. Today our stats are as follows:

Ammonia: 1ppm
Nitrite: 0.25ppm
Nitrate: 0ppm
Ph: 7.8

My LFS says that because of my ph, my ammonia level is not as dreadful as it sounds. Incredibly, I've had no fish deaths although I was concerned with a skin blotch on my ancistrus which I treated with an all-purpose bacterial and fugus infection treatment and he looks a lot better.

I am toying with the idea of either moving my red eyes into the main tank to ease the fish burden in the small tank or to add mature water from my main tank into my small tank. Thoughts would be appreciated.

 

[yvez9]

bettas are more resistant to ammonia then most other fish because they breath from the air instead of the water. However, it is not a good idea to house a male with females as they likely won't get along too good and they might eventually ytry to breed, which will make them even more ferocious.

as for the cycling problem, if you've been adding that ammonia remover, that will back kick it as it will kill off some of your bacteria you're trying to establish!

you could try to take a small piece of filter media from your 90 gallon tank and put it in the smaller filter, this should help stabilise things.

as for what the lfs guy said about ammonia, it is true to some extent but there still should be no ammonia in that tank!

good luck

 

[SkiFletch]

yeah, there shouldnt be any... does your tap water test out to 0ppm of ammonia? and moreover what is the exact stocking level of the smaller tank

 

[Ani]

bettas are more resistant to ammonia then most other fish because they breath from the air instead of the water. However, it is not a good idea to house a male with females as they likely won't get along too good and they might eventually ytry to breed, which will make them even more ferocious.

Thanks for this. I asked my LFS if I'd have any problems and they said that as long as I got more than one female, I'd be fine. Grrr! Evil LFS! I'll move them to my other tank once I settle the cycle down.

Thanks for the tip about the Ammonia remover - another helpful LFS tip! I'll stop using it immediately. I'll add a bit of mature water from my other tank to the small one and try to stablise that way.

Thanks for your comments, SkiFletch. My tap water is Oppm for Ammonia. Quantity-wise, I would have been fine with my 6 platies in the small tank - I think I just added them too quickly. Won't do that again!

Cheers guys

bettas are more resistant to ammonia then most other fish because they breath from the air instead of the water. However, it is not a good idea to house a male with females as they likely won't get along too good and they might eventually ytry to breed, which will make them even more ferocious.

Thanks for this. I asked my LFS if I'd have any problems and they said that as long as I got more than one female, I'd be fine. Grrr! Evil LFS! I'll move them to my other tank once I settle the cycle down.

Thanks for the tip about the Ammonia remover - another helpful LFS tip! I'll stop using it immediately. I'll add a bit of mature water from my other tank to the small one and try to stablise that way.

Thanks for your comments, SkiFletch. My tap water is Oppm for Ammonia. Quantity-wise, I would have been fine with my 6 platies in the small tank - I think I just added them too quickly. Won't do that again!

Cheers guys