# Confusing ammonia readings🤔



## matthewwoodgate (9 Apr 2021)

So I wanted to get an idea of what ammonia is in my aquarium. 20 litre nano cube.  I took a reading before a water change that I did today. It was 0.1 mg/l which I expected since I added some fish this week. Top end of the scale according to the JBL test kit. Then I took a reading after a 50% or more water change. And the reading was higher! 0.6-1. I did the test 3 times and it was higher. I did a reading on the water that I used for the change, a cut of 50:50 tap to RO. That was zero. Of course! Can anybody explain please?? What the heck is going on??


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## John q (9 Apr 2021)

Do you use prime to declorinate the water, if so that can sometimes give false readings on your ammonia test.
Also did you add the fertiliser in with the water change, I believe tropica specialised contains an amount of ammonium.


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## matthewwoodgate (9 Apr 2021)

John q said:


> Do you use prime to declorinate the water, if so that can sometimes give false readings on your ammonia test.
> Also did you add the fertiliser in with the water change, I believe tropica specialised contains an amount of ammonium.


I don’t use dechrorinator. Which you’ll probably tell me off for😬 and I put in 0.6ml of tropica after the change. im gunna test again tomorrow and if it’s still high just do another water change.


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## Hufsa (9 Apr 2021)

Seems very likely its the Tropica Specialised then. Because of the ratio of the nutrients it contains, we know for sure that it contains ammonia/urea and not nitrate.


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