[AquaticLife] Finished Cycling????
I haven’t had to dose drops of dechlor in a LONG time but if I remember correctly, most of the dechlor bottles sold for small tank owners have the one drop per gallon as a dosage… right? It shouldn’t be harming the fish, if overdosing of dechlor is done on occasion, but you don’t need 2-3 drops for a quart of water (4 cups) each time you top-off. When topping off just a little bit like that, I never did worry about adding a dechlor since previous overdoses of dechlor stays in the water column as free molecules until a chlorine/chloramine molecule is found to attach to and break down. It doesn’t evaporate since it is a “salt” compound (sodium thiosulphate is the primary ingredient in most dechlor products). If you’ve been doing this extra 2-3 drop dosage many times, I’m wondering if you might not have a heavy overdose of dechlor in your tank. I wouldn’t know how to test for this.
As a preventive measure, in case of severe dechlor overdosing, do a 25% PWC each day for the next week and ONLY add the proper dosage of dechlor for the amount of water that you are replacing. For example, if you are replacing 3G of water, then dose the dechlor for only 3G, not the full tank size. Vacuum your gravel with each PWC.. or at least the first couple to remove any excessive detritus that might have built up deep in the gravel. After that, your tank should be back to normal dechlor levels and optimal water parameters, so we can at least rule out that for future possibilities. Keep up with weekly PWC’s but leave the filter alone while we are working on your cycling issues. Once we have your tank fully cycled, then you can start doing weekly filter maintenance.
Since you mention that you add fresh carbon on a regular basis, DO NOT do filter maintenance right now and leave the filter alone for the next few weeks while we figure your cycling issues out. And the carbon might help with removing some of the excess dechlor additives that aren’t salt compounds.
The Tetra Aqua Safe should not go bad as long as it’s not ten years old or something like that. Always shake it first to make sure there hasn’t been any settling.
Since you mentioned that “tests show no chlorine in the water”, were you talking about your tap water or the tank? I think you mentioned you “live in LV” (and I know you didn’t mean inside me… my initials are LV.. lol) so I’m sure Las Vegas probably uses chloramine to disinfect the tap water. You could check online http://www.epa.gov/safewater/dwinfo/index.html (I did your homework… lol… ) with a couple of clicks leads to this page http://yosemite.epa.gov/ogwdw/ccr.nsf/Nevada?OpenView for the four water districts in Clark County so read your applicable water report or call them to verify whether they use chlorine, chloramine or some other disinfectant (there are a few others commonly used). While on the phone or checking on your tap water, also find out if they use the typical dose of 3-5ppm or maybe they use more or use something other than chloramine or chlorine. Here’s a copy of my last email conversation with my water utility company, back in 2006, about their treatment process. http://goldlenny.blogspot.com/2007/03/chlorine-chloramine-information.html
Lenny Vasbinder Fish Blog - http://GoldLenny.blogspot.com (Links to any articles referenced in above reply are listed on the right side, alphabetically under Labels and also under Archives by Year, Month)
Category: Philippines Internet Koi Society
