Ammonia in tap water!!!

[fraggle]

I did my usual 50% water change just before lunch, everything seemed normal, I went to work at 4, and came home to a dead Bala and a dead serpae tetra!!!
They seemed fine this morning, and they were swimming around before I went to work, I did think that all of them looked like they were breathing a fast, but then I think they all seems to get a little stressed during a water change anyway.
I just checked all my levels, and all fine except that I had ammonia levels of .5!!! So I checked the tap water and that's what the ammonia levels in the tap water are!!!
What the heck do I do about ammonia in the tap water? I know the waterboard have just changed over to using chloramine (which is a chlorine and ammonia combination) not just straight chlorine in the water, but I adjusted the amount of dechlor to cater for chloramine.
All the rest of the fish look OK, some of the black widow tetras are still a little washed out, as are some of the serpae tetras, but the cories are scooting around the bottom, and the dollars are fine, they don't seem to be breathing fast or anything, even my twig catfish is OK and they are pretty sensitive
Do you think it was the ammonia that killed them? (poor Chum, he was great! Loved how he darted around the tank)

[Algenco]

Either the dechlor will not handle chloramine, or it will and your reading ammonium which is harmless and something else caused the deaths

[Northernguy]

Sorry to hear about your fish Fraggle!:11:
Try testing your immediate neighbors water and see if you get the same readings.They won't think you are too nuts but they will not be happy to see any ammonium showing up either.

That is still quite high for tap water.
Have you been drinking it?

[Lady Hobbs]

I would check your water source a couple of times and let the tap run for awhile, too. Your water company may have just done a big cleaning adding extra for purification.

Strange you should mention this tho as I noticed one of my parrots had lost a bit of color yesterday. I just did a big water change and cleaned the gravel 3 days before but decided to test my water. I had ammonia, too, and have no idea why. A very established tank with two filters that have not been changed for some time. Only thing I could think of was my parrot had a spawn this week and I contributed it to dead eggs laying in the gravel. Either that or it was the new dechlorinated I used and perhaps it didn't do it's job as intended. I bought some stuff online called Genesis. 1 capful for 90 gallon is what it claims but perhaps it's not very good!

[fraggle]

Well for some bizarre reason I think I'm going through a mini cycle!!!! I didn't do anything out of the ordinary yesterday, but this morning I'm showing Nitrite as well!!!! It's not quite the purple of the .25, but it's not the blue of the 0 either.
I haven't lost any more fish, they all seem to be OK, but this is ridiculous, how can a fully cycled tank, with a great big cannister filter, decide to mini cycle after a gravel vac and water change that I've been doing for the past 18 months?


Algenco do the API master test kits show up ammonium?

Northern guy I'll do that (at a decent hour, LOL not at midnight like last night or flaming 6am now)

Hobbs that's probably not a silly as it sounds, with the levels of the water still dropping here, they must nearly be scraping just sludge off the bottom, I really must do something about getting a little pressure pump hooked up the the rain water tank (I've got 7000G sitting there, I just can't be bothered carting buckets from the back of the shed to inside! :c2:)

[TazManiac]

I would not be sure that it is a mini cycle. If your water has just started having ammonia in it from the tap, the bacterial colonies would need to be beefed up and you will notice an ammonia reading followed by a nitrite reading as the bacteria try to catch up.

That's my thoughts anyway.

I guess it could still be called a mini-cycle but not one of your doing. It would just be trying to catch up.

[fraggle]

Ok now I've lost some more fish, another couple of serpae, a buenos aries, 2 flame and my big Bala. I'm actually sitting here crying (silly sentimental person I am), I loved my Bala (Anchor he was called)

The tap on the rainwater tank is stuck too, I can't get it open!!! And my hubby is at work so I can't get him to open it, so I can't do a water change without ammonia tainted water!!!!
SHould I get some ammo-lock or zeolite or something? I don't want to sit here and watch my fish slowly drop off.

[Lady Hobbs]

Man ol' petes. This is awful. Did you check the tap water after letting it flush out for awhile? Are you SURE you added dechlorinator the last water change? I know I forgot it one time in my haste and doing all my tanks at one time. This is bad. I'd have hubby pick you up some Tetra SafeStart because it definately looks as you have another cycle going on.

Sorry hun!

[fraggle]

Thanks Hobbs :(

I did check the water again, I checked the cold water and the hot water (not that it should make a difference, but I tried anyway) after letting the taps run for several minutes (ran a bath for the kids, can't waste water here!) Still got .5 ammonia in both.

Hubby has picked up Ammo lock, because that's what the fish shop told him to get, they didn't have Tetra safe start, had never heard of it, I thought he probably would have been better with stresszyme if they stocked API stuff, but too late now.

I rang the water board, he just kept telling me that there has been ammonia in the water for ages, which I knew, what I couldn't get through to him was that it was registering on my test, which it never has before.

I might see if I can shift some of the fish into the 15G, that's set up and cycled and I didn't do a water change on it! I need to do a water change on the other 55 with Oscar in it, but I really dont' want to!

So you know every single aquarium I rang here to ask advice about the water (figured since they were on the same water they might know) told me that weekly water changes were far too often, and that I should only be changing 10%max every month or two! They said for shop tanks since they were so heavily stocked they needed to do them more often but that home aquariums only needed a change every other month.
One of the girls said that she'd given up doing water changes and hadn't done any for 6 months as she was having all sorts of problems while doing water changes

Poor fishies. Hope I don't lose anymore

[james481]

Sorry about your fish. :scry: Sounds to me like a chemical contamination of the tank, as I don't think an ammonia level of .5 would cause the death of all those fish that fast. Perhaps something in the tap, but more than likely some more local source of contamination. I would guess either aerosol chemicals or perhaps someone threw something bad in there (kids have a nasty habit of doing this for some reason). If I were you, I would actually start changing as much water as you can to see if you can save the other fish, but I suppose that's a gamble...

[Sharon]

Ammo Lock should help...it binds the Ammonia into a less toxic form...I doubt the .5ppm Ammonia is killing the fish that quickly, as well...Something got into the water(my opinion)...

[Northernguy]

Fraggle I'm sorry to hear about all your fish.The tetra safe start is cycle booster for new tanks and may help yours out.:22:

[Lady Hobbs]

I think the water changes really should depend on what kind of fish you have, your filtration and your stocking levels. Planted, with good stocking and a good filtration system not nearly as much as having oscars and pleco's, for instance. You have to do what you think is correct for your set-up.

This ammonia showing in your water is really the pits tho. I so would not like that. Good luck and hope no more fish die.

[Sharon]

I've been wondering about the 50% water change as well...I don't do over 35%, as I find large changes stress some fish...

[fraggle]

Last night the ammonia was up to betweem 1 and 2 and the nitrite to 1 and the tank was cloudy white, but haven't lost any more fish though but I'm a bit befuddled, I would have thought that the 2 neons (my mother in law got me 30 of them, which I hadn't got before as I thought they'd get eaten by the Anchor, the big Bala, which he did) and the lone Rummynose (I had 12 of them and they slowly dissapeared too) would have been more susceptible to bad water than the Balas or the Serpaes or the Buenos Aires, and I thought that my farlowella twig catfish would have died too, I'm very grateful that they haven't though!

I think I'll drop the water change levels. Only do 20% I think. I actually think I remember Dave saying that big water changes weren't good, I think I was just thinking that the more I change out, the cleaner the water and the better for the fishies, and I'd originally been told to do 50% too. Mind you I've never had any trouble doing 50% water changes before, but lesson learned I think.

Just checked the levels again now, just waiting the 5mins.
Ammonia is between .5 and 1 and nitrite is at .5.

Had a girl (who I rang to get a quote for the fish, as the water quality guy that I spoke to told me to apply for compensation for the fish, don't think that it will get anywhere but worth a shot anyway) say her boyfirend worked for the waterboard and that they put a dose of the chemicals through on a Sunday night, and on a Friday night, so the highest concentration is on a Monday (which is when I did my water change), so I should do my water changes on Thursday evening or Friday morning, that way it will be lower concentrations of whatever they decide to stick in the water.

The tank is at least clear this afternoon, not white and cloudy, hopefully over the hill and on the homeward stretch!

[Northernguy]

At least you figured out what the problem is! Hopefully they will reimburse you for your fish.
Its too bad you had to lose fish over it!:11:


They were worth thousands weren't they?thumbs2: lol

[fraggle]

LOL, the girl at the fish shop, she had lost fish herself (she said about $1500 worth) when the waterboard changed her water to bore water (because of the drought) without telling them, so she said she'd make it a good quote. She said she didn't get anywhere with compo, as they hadn't added anything to the water, it just was what it was, and they didn't actually have to inform people that they were changing the water source. She said I might get somewhere maybe (I'm not holding my breath though, let me tell you) as it was additives that they'd put in the water since ammonia shouldn't be registering out of the tap.

Thanks guys, you've been great! Just having someone to stress out to that doesn't think you're a nutter because "they're just fish"!

[Northernguy]

Thats why we are all here ,Its Theraputic!thumbs2: