Saltwater aquarium setup ammomia?

Question

I have a 90 gallon aquarium 70 lbs live rock, 100 lbs of sand, wet dry filter system. Can someone tell me why I get ammonia readings in every test 0.25 (I use red sea) but never any nitrite readings. Ph is 8.2. I do regular water changes.The tank has been set up for 2 months. I have algae growing and my fish are doing well just confused about the ammonia.

Answer 1

Sounds really odd to me. Any nitrates? I mean, 70 lbs live rock for two months and you have ammonia readings does not make much sense.

How many fish do you have in there? If you have a lot of livestock, you might consider adding more rock in stages until you get to 150 or so.

A sump and refugium would also be a great addition. You could have a deep sand bed.

Do you use a protein skimmer? If not, that would help remove fish waste.

The other possibility is you have a bogus reading on your kit. Buy another ammonium kit from a different manufacturer, or take a water sample to the local pet store, see if they get the same reading.

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Friend, i would not listen to this Danielle girl below. She does not state her credentials. The rule of 2 lbs max per gallon can be found in the works of Bob Fenner, Anthony Calfo, and Julian Sprung, among others. Check it out for yourself.

Knowing how much area 70 lbs takes up in your 90 gallon tank, you know you could easily double it and have plenty of room for fish to roam and for corals, anemones, clams or what have you.

Of course, if you use a refugium, you could load it up with rock to have more free space in the display. More rock certainly can't hurt. I've never heard anything other than "more is better" with rock. Of course, you need to have room to clean the walls of your tank and to be able to see what's going on, prevent blind spots for livestock to die and rot in.

Answer 2

What the heck are you trying to creat here? Lord! First off too much rock. You have no room after water displacement for fish. 100 pounds of sand, what geek told you this? Your sand should not be more than 1- 1 1/2 over the bottom of your tank. anything more than this is asking for problems with bacteria. You have an enclosed system, this is not the ocean and is not moved like the ocean. What ever pet store who came up with this 2 pounds of rock per gallon should be taken out and flogged. In an enclosed aquarium this is NOT possiable without only haveing one fish per tank. The purpose of LIVE ROCK was only to help salt water tanks cycle faster, unfortunately there is no FAST way. Rocks or not. You end up killing have of you rock base and if you only knew what actually will grow on your rock, have PATIENCE. Live rock isjust that LIVE with all kinds of neat little thing growing on it and in it.

You have too much sand. Bacteria cannot grow in these air pockets you have created. Pitch all the sand but 1" to 1 1/2" Why are you doing water changes? You have a new tank? Let it cycle. If you have fish, you did not let your water cycle. LIve rock does NOT cycle your water faster, another farse. These are live invertabreas that require strict nitrate levels. Be thankfull you have not lost everything. Glad the fish are well, however, do not add any more until the ammonia which need the nitrates/nitrites to disolve. Your tank is NOT cycled. Any larger fish will die. Water changes to remove the ammonia every two days if the levels are high. If you are still having a problem im or email me. Also, what ever company sold you all this stuff and gave you this line of BS, find another pet store.

My other question would be, how can you do water changes when your tank is only two months old? Salt water is once a month. This is not fresh water hun.

Answer 3

you have a thing called new tank syndrome, and it could take a few months to settle down. all new systems go through this. usually there is a lot of algae as well. keep up the water changes.

Answer 4

Fish pees ammonia. That's why you need to be cleaning it so often. So that your fish don't die.