what should i do? ammonia in tap water :(

[mas]

hey, i recently parted with a number of baby kribs which were in my 6x1.5x2 foot tank, but unfortunately (or fortunately) i had to remove all the plants to catch them (it ended up taking 2 hours even). anyways (there were no discus in the tank at the time) i ended up doing a large water change and reaquascaped my tank.

the next morning, all the fish were swimming as happily as the night before in their rearranged home, so without thinking i moved my 6 baby greens from the little tank to the big tank. they're doing pretty well, everyone is much much happier in the larger tank, they're all eating, swimming around everywhere and much less scared of people even, but 2 of them were a bit darker than usual.. so i tested the ammonia and it was at 0.50 (the third colour on the aquarium pharm. test kit). this was rather annoying so i did a 3 bucket water change (a bit over a quarter of the tank) thinking it was just from doing all the replanting, but i tested it again to-day and it was still 0.50! i checked my other tank and it was normal at just about 0, then not convinced decided to check the tap water.. which turned out to be 0.50! i even took water from another tap just to be sure and yeh the water at least near my place has 0.50 ammonia :( thats sucky..

anyways.. :) i was just wondering what would be the best thing to do. i have a tank with ammonia 0.50 and baby discus in it. they're infinitely happier in the big tank, but they might have to live with the ammonia until the filters catch up again.. will this effect their growth? i dont think any more water changes like this will be any good.. whats the easiest thing to do with the water until it gets better? it would be nice to leave them in the big tank as they did nothing but hide in the smaller tank. how about buying ro water..? any suggestions would be great.

thanks,
.mas

[dm]

If I was getting ammonia in my tap water I would make sure I had a holding tank for my water and put a cycled filter in it. This way you can heat the water to the proper temp before water changes and clear the ammonia out of it at the same time. Also if you airate it for a day you should get the pH to stablize closer to what it will end up being.

[mas]

yeh probably i should. i really dont prepare my water enough before i add it to the tanks, i usually run the tap for a bit, then fill up my bucket, add enough aqua plus (hey its cheap :)) stir it up, let it sit for about 20 mins, then add it to the tank. i havent lost a discus to ammonia before and my other tank is always at 0 with the same treatment.

hmmm perhaps it could have been rearranging my tank so drastically and stirring all the err stuff (:)), that builds up in the substrate.. but it was quite alarming to see it in the tap water.. i tested it once earlier this year and it was 0. oh well. hope it gets better soon or i have to get better with the water! :)

Buy a product that removes chloramine. Add it as you change water.

[nalah]

Mas
water conditioner you use is cheap...not really...add up the costs. you have to use heaps of it. trust me,best stuff here to buy is Prime. concentrated....

also,look at the sydney cychlid forum....theres a guy selling 200L drums for 20.00

dont use water staight from tap.leaving it for 20 minutes does nothing.... buy a drum... well worth it.less problems.

[Carol_Roberts]

Are you sure your test kit is accurate?
Carol :heart1:

[mas]

yeh, from all the suggestions im finally starting to use prime ;)

got another tank to-day as well, which im going to use as a spare tank for aging water (for at least a day) and medicine when needed. im getting a new filter as well, so hopefully that will get rid of the ammonia from the chloromines before it goes in the water.

yeh im pretty sure my test kit is working, it gave a zero reading for my established tanks so hopefully. we just got another one anyway as it was running out.

thanks again,
.marcus