My Betta has 3.0 Ammonia Level?

Question

Day before yesterday I sought advice for this at an ammonia level of 1.0. I was advised to do a water change until the ammonia level went down. Have changed the water twice, once each day. Now the ammonia level is up to 2.0 after the water change. It was almost at 3.0 before. This is a new tank. I overfed the fish at first. I've been changing 50% of the water once a week until two days ago then daily for two days. Before I changed the water two days ago I used ammolock. Have used stress coat to treat water and then stress zyme with each water change. Please help me. I don't want to lose my friend Michael.

Answer 1

Your tank is trying to cycle, keep doing the water changes and get that ammonia down even lower. Stop feeding for a few days. That ammo-lock will do little. There is nothing better than the 50% water changes that you are doing to take the ammonia and nitrites down. You may need to do this every other day until the process is done. Don't clean out your filter yet, let it seed with beneficial bacteria. Don't syphon all of the substrate at one time, clean out one side then the other. Keep doing big water changes as small ones under 50% do little to take the ammonia out. Betas are pretty tough, but they do require, like any fish, good water conditions. Test now for nitrites, which I'm sure at this point should be present. Salt at one teaspoon per gallon to alieviate stress due to nitrites. The last step in the cycling process is to see the presence of nitrates. If you have zero nitrates then your tank is still going through the cycle. First ammonia will drop to zero then the nitrites will drop to zero and then nitrates will have a reading. When this happens you can stop changing all the water all the time and go to a regular maintenence schedule. For your set up I'd do 25-50% every three weeks or so. The longer you wait between changes the larger water change I would do. If you wait a month and a half definately change out 50% or more. I wouldn't make a habit of waiting so long though, regular is better. Clean out your filter once a month to 6 weeks but not on the day you change water in the tank. You have to take care of all of the life in the tank, and that includes the beneficial bacteria. You don't want to reduce their numbers so that the tank begins to cycle again. Hope this helps and your little Michael thrives! BE patient it takes time.

Answer 2

Continue doing water changes. That's the best way to reduce the ammonia level. Check you tap water to see if it also contains ammonia. If so you may need to use bottled water (not distilled) until the tank completes it's cycle. Your tap water may contain some ammonia, but probably not enough to be in the dangerous levels and certainly below 3.0 so water changes even with tap that has a 1.0 would lower the level in your tank.

I very rarely suggest any type of ammonia controlling chemicals but instead of stresszyme, I would suggest you use Amquel. It will detoxify the ammonia but not interfere with the development of the cycle in the tank. It is also handy if your tap water contains ammonia.

This is the hardest part of a new tank, getting past the cycle. Once you get over this hump you will be home free.

MM

Answer 3

Do a water change. An ammonia level of 1 won't harm your betta. The ideal is .5 - 0

Did you test your tap water? You may be suprised to find it is already at 1.

How old is your tank? Sounds to me like it hasn't fully cycled. 20-25% water changes are enough.

Also, stress coat and stess zyme both are not needed. You need to use a good dechlor/conditioner since most stress coats do not remove chemicals from the water.

Test your tap water first. Your tank is going to have to complete its cycling process. Until then, 20-25% water changes and test daily until the levels stabalize.

What were your nitrates testing at?

Answer 4

Too much water changes. The bacteria have not had a chance to grow that break down waste and convert ammonia into nitrates. Just let it be.
Ammolock make ammonia less toxic. It will not actually remove it, so it will still register in the ammonia.
What kind of tank and filtration?

Answer 5

Are you reading the test strip correctly??? And exactly how many fish do you have, and in what size tank???

Your tank is going to take forever to cycle if you keep using all of the chemicals you've listed.

At this point you might be better off tearing the tank down, cleaning everything and starting over without the chemicals (except declorinator) as some of them can cause false readings on test strips, and no matter what the bottle says all that crap isn't very good for your fish especially since it appears you are massively overdosing.

Good luck.
E.

Answer 6

I agree you should test your tap water. It sounds like you are doing things right some times it takes time! also, the more stress your fish is going through the more ammonia will be produced.