Had a small heart attack tonight...

[dburt520]

So, I am pretty new here and to the hobby. This short story might seem funny to some as I am sure I am not the only one to experience this before.

 

Short back story: My tank is about 6 weeks old, and I only have two clowns and a few very tiny frags in it. Also have the typical CUC, but other than that, pretty boring so far.

 

I am brand new to the hobby, so I am still in the "testing every night is fun" mode... so since day 1, I have tested and documented it in a log. I saw the spike in the beginning as I should etc.

 

Everything has been very stable for 3-4 weeks now.

 

Fast forward to now: I bought a baster yesterday from the LFS to start target feeding the couple corals that I do have (which went very well BTW). So tonight I go to do my water change and instead of the small plastic baster that I generally fill my test tubes up with (it is the clear plastic one that comes with most refractometers), I decide to use the turkey baster that i just bought, thinking it is big enough to fill my 3 or 4 test tubs in one squirt...

 

I start with Amonia, and before I can even get the test tube cap on it is already turning dark green.... I pooped. I go on with the rest of my tests giving the amonia test the 5 mins to finish before taking my reading... After 5 mins the green was OFF THE CHART green... almost dark blue.

 

 

I retest, same results. My heart sunk and my first thought was"damnit, I am a noob, what did I possibly do wrong".

 

I spend the next two hours reading and reading and reading on what exactly I could have possibly done to cause this, I am watching my two fish etc.

 

I finally decided, maybe I should try my test again and use the original baster that I usually use... I do two tests at once just for piece of mind and both of them read 0 ammonia (as they have since my cycle ended). I thought that was odd, so I did two more tests with the original baster and then follow it up with two tests with the new baster.. the new baster turns green immediately.

 

So... long story short I guess, don't do your ammonia tests with the same baster that you spot feed your corals with.

 

I don't know if it is some kind of reaction with the plastic on the new baster, or if the residue from the RODS frozen food (I thought I washed it out well after feeding), but there is an extremely high amount of ammonia in that baster and now I am scared to put it anywhere near my tank.

 

Dave

[Lawnman]

I came in ready to read about your visit to the ER!

[dburt520]

No such luck if you were hoping to read about any ER visits... sorry.

[(oYo)]

Problem solving isn't for everyone. That story could have been 600 less words

[ryanwongg]

great to know! thanks

[dburt520]

Problem solving isn't for everyone. That story could have been 600 less words

Rough crowd..

 

I suppose if I want to deal with assholes, I can go back to the other site.

[Justin_Luke]

Problem solving isn't for everyone. That story could have been 600 less words

Really? Come on man, either help out or keep out of the conversation. dburt was using this forum for exactly what it was meant for, to give advice by using personal experience. I dont see a problem with that.

[mpell]

Rough crowd..

 

I suppose if I want to deal with assholes, I can go back to the other site.

Yeah. it does seem like its becoming somewhat of a trend over the past couple days

[vegasgundog]

That's why I have two 60ml syringes. One for feeding and one for testing. Glad I want paranoid. Might not be as bad as a Turkey baster, the bulb probably holds a lot of leftovers if not cleaned out.

[Reefer82]

That's why I have two 60ml syringes. One for feeding and one for testing. Glad I want paranoid. Might not be as bad as a Turkey baster, the bulb probably holds a lot of leftovers if not cleaned out.

Which is exactly I rinse out my sea squirt after every feeding. The bulb holds a ton of crap.

[Chew_Magna]

I keep separate tools for each thing myself. I use a baster for feeding and sucking out stuff I don't want in the tank, I use a condiment squirt bottle for water test vial filling.