How are my numbers?

[becky913]

Hi all! I have a 92 gallon reef. Last Sunday I moved all my rocks and changed about 15 -20 gallons of water removing a lot of debree. I also added carbon. My numbers today were
PH 8.2
Alk 3.5
Nitrate, Nitrite 0
Cacium: Unsure of test so somwhere between 375 and 575 (need to get another brand, I am not sure exactly what they consider blue!)
Amonia - 0.2
Are those ok? I know amonia should be 0 but the other numbers seem ok. Should I change more water? Help Please!!

 

[trigger11]

The only thing that looks off to me would be the ammonia. Which was likely caused from moving all of the rock around and stirring up the substrate. It's best to avoid stirring up the substrate if possible. Depending on what you stir up it can cause a mini-cycle to happen.
Doing a regular scheduled water change should help with that.

 

[becky913]

I kind of wondered if I started a cycle. So weekly water changes should help? How much would you change? I hate to say it, but I am not real motivated...........spent all day on it last sunday!

 

[trigger11]

It could be a tough call. The ammonia level isnt super high but any amount of it is not good for the fish. If you havent observed any abnormal behavior from the fish in the last week you could possibly get away without doing a water change. I would run the ammonia test again just to be sure though. If low level detected it should clear up in a couple days. To be on the safer side a small water change wouldnt hurt.

 

[dmitry]

A lot of people do their water changes every two weeks. You can change about 20% of total water volume. It definitely shouldn't take you all day! Maybe 30 mins.

 

[nereef]

i'm confused. are you cycling a new tank?

 

[geoj]

If you are running carbon check your phosphate.

 

[becky913]

Originally Posted by Dmitry
A lot of people do their water changes every two weeks. You can change about 20% of total water volume. It definitely shouldn't take you all day! Maybe 30 mins.
Usually it doesn't, but I redid all the rock work and had to wait for the water to clear so I could see what I was doing. You know h ow that goes............you have to move the rocks lots of times to get it right!