Ammonia Levels Need To Go Down.

Hey! I have a 5 gallon tank (which is the only I can afford) and I have 2 female Betta. I cycled the tank April of last year and I now just realized the ammonia levels are going really high. Currently it’s at a 0.25 ppm and it’s not going down. I’ve tried ammo lock and all it does is keep it the ammonia levels down overnight but then the ammonia comes back again. Am I doing something wrong? How do I get it down?

 

Hi, a 5g tank is way too small for 2 female bettas, honestly I’d return one to the store. Anyways, what is your PH? What are you nitrite and nitrate readings of this tank?
How often and how much water are changing?
The best thing you can do is frequent water changes when ammonia and nitrite are present.

.25 ammonia is not very high but it does show that something is going on with your cycle. Did you recently throw away any filter media or decorations in your tank?

Also, adding live aquarium plants will help with ammonia levels as they will consume the ammonia before it is converted to nitrates helping not only the ammonia levels but the end resulting nitrate levels.

 

Stop using ammo-lock. I recommend using Prime instead. Instead of locking up the ammonia it just detoxes it. Bacteria can't eat locked up ammonia so it just keep rising.

I agree with CindiL .25ppm isn't high enough to get overly concerned about. Is it possible something has changed with your tap water? Has your water company started using chloramines instead of chlorine? If they have you will get an ammonia reading after breaking the chlorine/ammonia bond that makes up chloramines. Your water conditioner will remove the chlorine but not the ammonia. The bacteria in the tank should remove the ammonia over time.

 

Hey! I have a 5 gallon tank (which is the only I can afford) and I have 2 female Betta. I cycled the tank April of last year and I now just realized the ammonia levels are going really high. Currently it’s at a 0.25 ppm and it’s not going down. I’ve tried ammo lock and all it does is keep it the ammonia levels down overnight but then the ammonia comes back again. Am I doing something wrong? How do I get it down?

Did it ever go higher than 0.25ppm?

 

Did it ever go higher than 0.25ppm?

Nope. The highest it’s always been is 0.25 ppm

 

Nope. The highest it’s always been is 0.25 ppm

Then this is not a problem. It is very common for even very well established aquariums to read 0.25ppm ammonia.

So long as it does not go higher than that, treat it as a false positive reading and consider it zero. There have been many hypothesis as to why there is this persistent 0.25ppm ammonia reading. Long story short, it does not matter and yeah, you are fine if it never goes higher than 0.25ppm ammonia.

 

Then this is not a problem. It is very common for even very well established aquariums to read 0.25ppm ammonia.

So long as it does not go higher than that, treat it as a false positive reading and consider it zero. There have been many hypothesis as to why there is this persistent 0.25ppm ammonia reading. Long story short, it does not matter and yeah, you are fine if it never goes higher than 0.25ppm ammonia.

Thank you so so much !

 

Thank you so so much !

Yw. ^_^