AMMONIA LEVELS

[Craig09]

hi guys ive just moved house and transferred me fish over, i have a 120 ltr tank and i cleaned the filters 2days before i moved and gradually broke the tank down over the week ready for the move so the day i moved there was just the sand filters & heater in, also fish untill they were put in storage tubbs while we moved the tank anyway i kept half the water out the tank and took it with me, i re-set the tank up within the hour from moving it put 3 or 4 fresh buckets of water in and all was fine set up again lovley but it wasnt till a couple days later i did a water test and my ammonia quite high ive been doing daily water changes 10% and the odd days 20% but it doesnt seem to be lowering the fish are ok i think so what im thinking is the tank going through new tank symdrone and starting a new cycle in the tank ive also heard that to many big water changes can be harmfull to the fish is this true . so any advice would be grate cheers craig

 

[Doodles]

Whats the PH?

You could use seachem prime as it converts the ammonia to a non toxic form but doesnt remove it which will allow the cycle to continue, it also does the same with nitrite

 

[Craig09]

ph is about 7.6

 

[Doodles]

ok thats going to make the ammonia more toxic, so i would def get some prime

Important notes on ammonia and pH​

Often, when ammonia levels rise in an aquarium, the pH will drop. It would be a logical assumption to attempt to correct this situation by raising the pH to normal levels. This would be logical, but it is far from correct and in fact could be deadly to your fish. Ammonia takes two forms in water, free ammonia and ammonium ions, with free ammonia being the more toxic form. A pH increase of one unit causes the percentage of free ammonia to increase by about ten times. Put simply, as pH increases ammonia becomes more toxic to the fish.
It is usually best to leave a low pH alone while fighting high ammonia levels. The fish in the tank have slowly become accustomed to the lower pH and you are not about to add any new fish at this time! It is difficult to try to maintain the normal pH levels when ammonia is high. This means the pH drops, then you raise it, then it drops again and you raise it again. Can you see another problem here? The constantly changing pH is further stress on fish that are already lining up for some Valium. This leads us to our new logical conclusion, leave the pH alone until ammonia levels drop, then slowly (.2 every 12-24 hrs.) bring the pH back to appropriate levels.

http://www.beverlyspet.com/fishtalk/Handling%20High%20Ammonia%20Levels.htm

 

[Irene0100]

I guess the filters were not actually running for some time?
any idea how long? the bacteria in them die after a number of hours and then can become toxic. so yes you may well have new tank behaviour and need some bio-start or something to help seed the filter bacteria quicker.

 

[Craig09]

the filters were off for an hour & half at the most then set back up

 

[macvsog23]

Filters can go for up to 24 hours before "Crashing out" but the key is how they were "loaded" before A over stocked and over feed tank will have a filter that has matched the situation stop the oxygen ie water running over the media and it will start to die as they filter may have a large load of bacteria in it this will die and become a problem.
Just as a filter with a very low stocked tank and very sparce feeding will have a lower amount of bacteria so will last longer .

Look at it as keeping a dead cat and a dead Donkey they are both dead but they will both provide different amounts of "Space" or "food" for bacteria.

 

[Irene0100]

lol -dead cats and donkeys!
Sounds like filter should not have completely died (unless got very chilled or something.) anyway some bi0-stuff wont hurt if you are still getting problems??
is the water in your new house very different - I guess you have not moved a long way but might be diff water supply?