# Ammo Lock overdose?



## xpac

Is it possible to OD on Ammo Lock? I had a momentous spike of ammonia a few days ago, so I bought so ammo lock to hopefully quell it. I also added another bag of bio-spira and some cycle (big containers). Here's what I'm consistently getting, a huge spike in ammonia (I realize that it is detecting the non-toxic version converted by the ammo lock), a nice rise in nitrate level, but ZERO nitrites! How can the nitrate level and ammonia level be increasing, but the nitrites remain at zero? Does this make any sense, or did I somehow screw something up by using too much ammo lock?

Almost forgot, I did add salt based on DonH's pinned article, because two of the three terns were showing fungus infection (which is clearing up nicely btw). I know salt is supposed to help with alleviating nitrite poisoning, but can it be responsible for the zero nitrite readings I'm getting?


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## RhomZilla

What kind of media do you have installed in your filter? If active carbon is present, the chemicals in the ammonia lock might have been cancelled, removed., or become inactive in the tank. Also, the use of Bio-Spira with other chemicals might kill the beneficial bacteria needed to process the cycling.


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## xpac

I do have carbon in my filters, maybe I should remove it as it may be affecting the ammo lock. But according to Ammo Lock, the ammo lock product itself does NOT affect the biological filter/bacteria, that's why I got it.


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## deeboi

Right now I'm running into a similar situation and my ammonia nitrate was rising while the nitrite was at zero. Although in my situation it could have been the test for the nitrite. What de-chlor are you using? The advice I was told was to do water changes of at least 50% and it seems to be helping. My last water change was Friday of 50% and I had my water tested today and my ammonia is already down. Now I just gotta catch up with the water changes.


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## Raptor

For 1 the ammolock is gonna make you have false readings, And probably is keeping the biospira from working properly. On the back of biospira it says only use the recomended declhor. You are getting a normal cycle spike now your nitrites are going to.
By adding the Cycle stuff you refferred to, It is just ammonia in a bottle. That stuff doesent work. You just added more ammonia in.
What are your perameters?


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## xpac

Ok, I didn't realize the cycle stuff was ammonia, it CLAIMS to be bacteria. The ammonia reading is high, 8.0 but I bought a free ammonia sensor yesterday and it is reading 0 ppm of free ammonia, so that would mean that the false readings I'm getting are actually the ionized ammonia which is non-toxic. The troubling thing to me is whether or not I've killed all the bacteria by converting the ammonia to a form which it cannot eat. I'll start by doing a 20% water change when I get home, and maybe do one every other day and see if that helps things.


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## Raptor

I dunno if it killed the bacteria or if it's starving it. But i do know it will slow it down. Feed very sparingly, And only do small waterchanges when it's a must.
Good luck.


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## DonH

xpac said:


> The troubling thing to me is whether or not I've killed all the bacteria by converting the ammonia to a form which it cannot eat.


 I really don't understand this concept... If Ammo-Lock (and other similar products like AmQuel and Prime) detoxifies the ammonia, why would the resulting ammonium not be an available food source to the nitrifiers? If that were the case, than everytime these products are used for a routine water change, we are "starving" the nitrifiers as long as the chemicals are still active in the water.

If Bio-Spira is indeed the correct species of nitrifiers, than Ammo-Lock shouldn't affect it (IMHO). It all boils down to marketing... Marineland would obviously recommend you use a water conditioner made by them in conjunction with Bio-Spira (also from Marineland). Just the same as Kordon's AmQuel recommends the use of NovAqua, and various antibiotics recommend water changes using their water conditioners.


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## Raptor

The strain targets to attack ammonia. Now granted the ammolock is just detoxifying the ammonia isn't it changing the composition? Do we know if the real nitrifyers isn't slowed down?
I am not trying to dissagree don you are well above my level.







I have a tendancy to take the safe side and adhering to directions.


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## RhomZilla

DonH said:


> I really don't understand this concept... If Ammo-Lock (and other similar products like AmQuel and Prime) detoxifies the ammonia, why would the resulting ammonium not be an available food source to the nitrifiers?


 Thats one thing I was trying to figure out... He uses bio-spira to cycle the tank, ammonia being one ingredient to start the cycle, are needed to be present for nitrifyers to eat off, but why would one use ammo-lock to control/hold it back? Would the process that he's doing cancell out the purpose completely?


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## xpac

RhomZilla said:


> DonH said:
> 
> 
> 
> I really don't understand this concept... If Ammo-Lock (and other similar products like AmQuel and Prime) detoxifies the ammonia, why would the resulting ammonium not be an available food source to the nitrifiers?
> 
> 
> 
> Thats one thing I was trying to figure out... He uses bio-spira to cycle the tank, ammonia being one ingredient to start the cycle, are needed to be present for nitrifyers to eat off, but why would one use ammo-lock to control/hold it back? Would the process that he's doing cancell out the purpose completely?:rock:
Click to expand...

Ok here's what happened, the tank appeared to be cycled, 0 ammonia, 0 nitrite, and moderate level of nitrate. Then two days before my piranhas arrived, I added some big goldfish feeders (big mistake for several reasons). Once my P's arrived and I added them to the tank, I tested the water like two days later and found an ENORMOUS ammonia spike. Since my other tank is not fully cycled, the only option I could think of was to use ammo lock to ionize the free ammonia until the bacteria could "catch up" with the ammonia level. According to the product, it does not affect the bacteria's ability to nitrify, meaning that the bacteria supposedly can nitrify ionized ammonia as easily as they can free ammonia. I just wasn't sure, because it's been several days and the ammonia level doesn't seem to have gone down, the nitrite level is still at zero, and the nitrate level has gone up. I thought it was kinda weird.....


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## DonH

It's most likely your ammonia test kit is giving off false readings due to the Ammo-Lock. An increase in bioload will cause a spike, but in an established tank, it should recover quickly (depending on the size of the tank, type of filtration, and how many fish were added at one time).


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## xpac

DonH said:


> It's most likely your ammonia test kit is giving off false readings due to the Ammo-Lock. An increase in bioload will cause a spike, but in an established tank, it should recover quickly (depending on the size of the tank, type of filtration, and how many fish were added at one time).


 Yeah, the fish seem healthy, swimming freely, eating 2-3 times daily (they are babies), and the ammonia sensor that I bought is still reading 0 ppm of free ammonia so I think everything is ok. I can't do any water changes for another week and half, since I had to add salt (thanks for your article btw Don) to clear up a fungus infection and I want it to stay in the tank for the full two weeks. But once that is done, I expect the readings to return to normal once I've been able to do some water changes.


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## DonH

Go ahead and do the water changes... Just replace the amount of salt in proportion to the volume of water changed.


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## xpac

DonH said:


> Go ahead and do the water changes... Just replace the amount of salt in proportion to the volume of water changed.


 Good idea, I'll do it now, thanks again!


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