Terrible time for a crash.

Just as I was starting to feel relieved seeing my Ammonia level drop, it peaked again, this time close to 1.0ppm and I got new Coral coming in today. MY GOD! I can’t find anything dead, last week I cut back on the feeding when I first noticed my Ammonia up to 0.25ppm and I stopped using flake food. I did several small water changes though the days. I changed my filter media in my canister filter and cleaned it, so when you do this and everything is clean and new inside there, when it gets re-colonized with bacteria can that cause this to happen? Because I have no idea what else is doing it.

 

Amquel! Ftw!

 

Or Prime,both are good ammonia binders.asap

Edit-no,I don't have spikes when I clean my canister,but I clean it once a week,any longer i've found will allow enough bacteria to colonize to create a small spike when cleaned.I also don't keep any biofiltration media in it (rubble rock,ceramic rings,etc) as I don't want my canister being a part of my biofiltration,just mechanical/chemical.That's what my liverock is for.

 

Your right Toallhisdoom, long term solution is get rid of all fish, get rid of the canistor filter and rely on the skimmer only to make a heathy enviorment for the Corals only :/

 

my guess is you lost some of your good bacteria in the cleaning process and started a mini cycle... What size tank? Live rock and amount? are you running a Protein Skimmer?

 

What do you have in your system now?
How big is the tank and how much LR
Also how old is the tank?

 

That could be the reason grinder37, last weeks cleaning and changing was the first time I did it since I set the tank up 4 months ago, my bad!! I did prime it, how long will this last? If I shut the Canister filter down would the live rock, etc get it down faster?

 

I got a 40b, I got about 40 lbs of live sand and about 90 lbs of live rock, the tank is 4 months old.

 

Read the bottle,in emergencies,you can safely overdose prime by up to 5 times the normal dose.I also added more to my first post that you may want to read.

 

There is 2 perculas and 1 gramma, snails and reef hermits, 2 peppermint shrimp, a porcelan<? crab, then my coral