Advice needed:nitrite and ammonia in my tank

[sophie68]

Hi all,:)

I just came back from a 3 weeks break and I found my discus okay (a pair had actually laid eggs for the first time...) but since I have been back, I have been having problems. They were only fed every other day and had 1 weekly WC. There was also an aquaclear with chemipure in it. I removed the aquaclear as my ph was around 5 and I was fearing a ph crash. Usually my ph is around 6.8. Yesterday I did a 40% WC. My problem is that now I have 0.25 of nitrites and 0.50 of ammonia. I am worried as I never had ammonia in my tank before. So far, the fish look okay. I added a big bio spira pouch and salt to protect the fish. Any advice to reduce ammonia is welcome. Now that I put the bio spira, I don't want to remove too much water....Catch 22 situation....
Thanks for your help!!!!!

Sophie

[Tropical Haven]

Sophie,
You already did a 50% water change so your PH should have gone up a little and that won't hurt your fish. I would continue to do a 50% water change everyday until your ammonia and Nitrites are gone.

[Graham]

Swine has it

The pH did crash...6.8 to 5.0 did a job on the bacteria that's why the re-cycle. Removing the AC with the chemi-pure just removed more bacteria

G

[sophie68]

Hi again,

Apart from daily WC, is there anything else I can do? Would it help to put the aqua clear again? Is Bio Spira going to help me in your opinion????

Thanks!
Sophie

[Graham]

The water change should be fine...they should bounce back quite quickly

[sophie68]

Hi again,

Thanks for the advice! The ammonia is slowly going down. I am patiently waiting!!:)

Thanks
Sophie

[Tropical Haven]

Sophie,
You will be just fine, once your ammonia goes to zero I would keep up with the daily water changes for 3 to 5 more days just to make sure your filter gets completely jump started again. This will avoid any spikes in ammonia or Nitrite.