cloudy tank...whats going on???

[malroy77]

Hey Everyone,

Im new on OVAS...and i have a few questions! If anyone has any advise please let me know...im open to anything...i have had my tank for about 6 weeks now. i let it cycle for 8 days before i added fish. when i was finally able to add some, i purchased 2 mollies and 2 plattys and about a week later 2 frogs...everything was fine until my water stared to turn really cloudy (one of my mollies and both my frogs died). the water is a white-ish grey colour. I have tried many different things from testing my water (my amonia was high) to treating it with chemicals that i was recomended at the store. I bought a new filter yesterday (the fluval 304) and apparently it is really good (i havent put it in yet, im going to tomorow). Nothing seems to be helping...again if anyone has anymore ideas that would be awesome...i want to add more fish but i dont want to until everything is up to par.


PLEASE HELP!

Thanks a bunch,

Mal

btw my boyfriend is Homestar726...he has made posts about my tank and if anyone has some spare media that would be really awesome! thanks again 

[Nerine]

it sounds like your tank isn't finished cycling.
changing filters won't change anything unless your tank is overstocked or your filter was bad...

here are some questions to answer:

what kind of chemicals did you use?
how much are you feeding?
how often do you do water changes?
how often do you test your water?
what are your readings?

[fender316]

chemicals will make your water cloudy from my experience, mini cycles being the issue.   i wouldnt trust any of em, thats why I switched to RO/DI.  try carbon instead, it helps with discoloration and bad smells too.  i just put sugar in my salt tank and it caused a mini cycle (cloudy water), experminenting.  heard that it will help promote certain algae that will fight the cyano.  the cloudy water was the first sign of this new algae i suppose.

[malroy77]

well i was told to overdose on my conditioner...i use prime

i thought i was over feeding at first so i cut back big time


i have been doing regular water changes (1-2 times a week at 15-30% max)
*[i was given mixed advice when starting my tank, i was originally told no water changes for the first 4 weeks in a new tank, i later on was told i should have been doing many mini water changes every week, i have done about 3 since i found out this new information]*

i only got my test kit on the weekend, so i have tested once since then, however i took a bottle of my water to Big Al's about 3 1/2 weeks ago and they tested it for me, the ammonia, nitrite and nitrate levels haven't really changed at all since then

and my readings are: ammonia 2.0 ppm  nitrite 0.5 ppm and nitrate 0 ppm
i know my ammonia is really high but it doesn't seem to be going down at all

who knows maybe i am just paranoid and my tank is still cycling...but it has been six weeks...I'm getting really frustrated comming home to a cloudy tank every day and I'm sure my fish are not as happy as they should be

[Nerine]

your ammonia is much too high...but you could be getting false readings if you use Prime. and do not overdose on conditioner!! Read the bottles. Prime says only dose up to a certain point. Overdosing can do more damage than good.

It sounds like your tank is not finished cycling. 6 weeks really isn't that long if you think about it! you're setting up a mini eco system, and there have been setbacks...such as overdosing with chemicals, not doing the water changes and the possibility of overfeeding...Be patient and things will soon be normal.

[beowulf]

For a cold cycle this is not to long.  The easiest way to speed things up is to add some filter media or decorations from a well cycled tank.  This brings in the right bacteria to help things go faster.

[kennyman]

When you say you let your tank cycle for 8 days unless you added a source of ammonia your were just running water around for no reason. The bacteria cycle can not start without a source of food. The day you added fish you started cycling because they started releasing ammonia. You needed to only start with a few fish so that ammonia would not get sooo high so fast.

The first bacteria type has colonised in your tank now and is converting ammonia, but the second species of bacteria is not active yet. You are about 1/2 way through 

Like Beowulf suggested; If you have a friend with fish get some gunky filter floss from them and wad it into your filter somewhere like NOW. And do 2 50% water changes over the next 12 hrs to manage ammonia.

Hope things get better for you quickly.

[homestar726]

I just install a fluval 304 today for her, and hopefully I can get some media to help her out. I think the spong and filter media in the fluval will help bring the cycle faster. once we get some outside media to speed it up. Im not a big conditioner booster, but she was told that there was no warm in over conditioning???

Any feed back from any passsers by would help the more voices the better.

Ps. The orignal filter was the single biowheel. SO I figured the fluval 304 would help make a mre stable environment once the tank has cycle???

THanks

[Nerine]

I have heard conflicting answers on overdosing with water conditioner. Prime has instructions on the back about overdosing

Seachem Prime
"Converts ammonia to non-toxic form which can be removed by biofilter. Can be used to alleviate ammonia/nitrite stress in cycling tank. For exceptionally high chloramine concentrations, a double dose may be used safely. To detoxify nitrite in an emergency, up to 5 times normal dose may be used. If temperature is > 86 °F (30 °C) and chlorine or ammonia levels are low, use a half dose. Prime(tm) will not over-activate skimmers."

[malroy77]

thanks everyone for the advice...u know i have been given so much bad information and advice over the last few weeks concerning my fish its hard to know what to do...im really not pleased with the person who told me that over conditioning is ok...they said you can go up to 5 times the amount it says on the bottle. ANYWAYS...

why is Prime not going to give me a good reading? is there something wrong with it? if so what is recomended?

Thanks,

Mal

[Nerine]

From the Prime FAQ
http://www.seachem.com/support/FAQs/Prime_faq.html

Q:I tested my tap water after using Prime and came up with an ammonia reading. Is this because of chloramine? Could you explain how this works in removing chloramine?

A: Prime works by removing chlorine from the water and then binds with ammonia until it can be consumed by your biological filtration (chloramine minus chlorine = ammonia). The bond is not reversible and ammonia is still available for your bacteria to consume. Prime will not halt your cycling process.
I am going to assume that you were using a liquid based reagent test kit (Nessler based, silica). Any type of reducing agent or ammonia binder (dechlorinators, etc) will give you a false positive. You can avoid this by using our Multitest Ammonia kit (not affected by reducing agents) or you can wait to test, Prime dissipates from your system within 24 hours

[kennyman]

heh so thats why that stuff doenst work for me. I dont have any chlorine to start with 

[KLKelly]

Ive done tests with Prime and its never returned a higher reading.  I have ammonia in my tap water so I have experimented to make sure my ammonia readings were acurate or if Prime threw it off.  Through my tests it actually shows a reduced ammonia reading (but not immediately after adding Prime - I always wait a few hours before retesting). 

Because I have high PH and ammonia in my tap water I often double dose and I wouldnt hesitate to continue doing so.  I think Prime would be less toxic than ammonia.  Ive had a fish get burned by ammonia and its was a sad sight (before I knew about cycling).

I had to do 50-75% water changes a day to keep water at a non toxic level.  There is an ammonia toxicity table linked somewhere on this site I believe but I cant find it now that I looked.

Karrie