Sudden ammonia spike and don't know what to do

[gus6464]

On friday I did my weekly water change of 15% and then I went away for the weekend until sunday night. When I got home I noticed the tank had a massive cyano bloom and it was because sometime during the weekend the power went out and it reset my timer so the lights stayed on for god knows how long. I checked my water parameters and they were normal but I did another 15% water change again on monday to try and get rid of some of the cyano. Today I checked my water again and ammonia went up to .5ppm so I panicked and did a 1 gallon water change but ammonia is still the same. At this point what do I do? Should I do a bigger water change tomorrow? I also accidentally stirred up the sand a lot when I was moving some rock around. Would this have caused it?

 

ammonia .5 ppm

nitrite 0

nitrate 0

alkalinity 11KH

 

I have filter floss, cheato, purigen, and chemi-pure elite in the first chamber.

[nano427]

If you do not regularly stir/vacuum sand then this is definitely the cause.

[gus6464]

If you do not regularly stir/vacuum sand then this is definitely the cause.

 

How often should I stir the sand so this doesn't happen again? Would getting 3 nassarius snails help a bit?

[lgreen]

If you do not regularly stir/vacuum sand then this is definitely the cause.

 

No...that has nothing to do w/ it.

 

Your tank experienced some die off from the power outage and therefore you are seeing increased ammonia levels (basically some of your bacteria that reduce ammonia to nitrite were killed).

 

Use water changes (and yeah bigger one is a good idea) to keep the ammonia level down until your tank has a chance to reestablish the bacterial populations that reduce ammonia naturally.

 

Keep checking your ammonia daily and doing water changes until your ammonia is at 0 again.

[justinT]

I had a poweroutage a few weeks ago, for two days! I didn't have an ammonia spike, but my nitrites were creeping up. I added a product called bio-spira, made by Instant ocean, that is a collection of nitrifiying bacteria. Next day the nitrites were gone.

 

I think you can also add those ammo-lock products, which convert the ammonia into a less toxic form ( i dont' know the chemistries off the top of my head). water changes and waiting then!

[gus6464]

No...that has nothing to do w/ it.

 

Your tank experienced some die off from the power outage and therefore you are seeing increased ammonia levels (basically some of your bacteria that reduce ammonia to nitrite were killed).

 

Use water changes (and yeah bigger one is a good idea) to keep the ammonia level down until your tank has a chance to reestablish the bacterial populations that reduce ammonia naturally.

 

Keep checking your ammonia daily and doing water changes until your ammonia is at 0 again.

 

So should I do a 3 gallon (25%) change tomorrow or just wait until friday and then do a huge one (50%?).

[lgreen]

So should I do a 3 gallon (25%) change tomorrow or just wait until friday and then do a huge one (50%?).

 

see what your ammonia is tomorrow. i'd say if you are still showing any ammonia go ahead and do another 3-4 gallon water change, then test it again the next day and update us as to what is going on and I'll be sure to follow up w/ what to do next if needed.

[gus6464]

see what your ammonia is tomorrow. i'd say if you are still showing any ammonia go ahead and do another 3-4 gallon water change, then test it again the next day and update us as to what is going on and I'll be sure to follow up w/ what to do next if needed.

 

Well I did a 3 gallon water change last night and ammonia levels this morning have gone back to 0 or almost 0 (hard to tell with the API kit). The good news is that my GSP is starting to open up again after being closed ever since the spike started so that's always a good sign. Thanks everyone for the help and I just have one more question. Should I do my weekly water change today or since I did one already last night it should be ok until next week?