Ammonia test turns ORANGE?!?!?!!?

sillypony

sillypony

Fish+College=BROKE
Mar 27, 2008
267
0
0
38
WNY
So i set up my stuff, and sit down to do my water tests. Do the 55, and its fine, in fact nitrate is lower than i wanted it to be for my plants! So i check the 10, and its OK, and then i move on to my qt tank.

The qt tank has a small L75 pleco, a sponge filter, a piece of drift wood and some plants. No substrate. It has a dose of prazipro as well (thus the need for qt'ing).

My nitrite test on it was finally 0, nitrates are practically 0, and then I look at the ammonia test...

it is ORANGE! not yellow, or green, but orange. The color of the 5.0ppm on the NITRATE card. WTF??? I've never seen this before.

I use api liquid tests, and the other tanks didn't turn orange, the 55 stayed yellow, and the 10 took on a hint of green, but the qt was orange as soon as i put in the second chemical?

I retested, with the same result...


now what?
 
large water change?
was the sponge for the qt a cycled sponge?
 
i planned on that anyways, to get the prazi out for a few days before i do the second dose.

But orange isn't an ammonia test color, it is always in shades of yellow and green. Orange is a nitrate test color. Thus, it isn't a so-called-possible color. Thus i have no idea what the ammonia level is (it should be 0, as last week readings were 0ammonia, and .5 nitrite)
 
Suspect contaminant in the test tube/wrong bottle of re-agent added (I only say that second possiblity because I've done it myself.

Otherwise, faulty test kit.

I would retest.
 
I'll go rinse the tubes (again) and see how it goes. I KNOW I used the right bottles, as my b/f made this fancy lil segmented storage box thats practically error proof. Plus i checked after I got orange.

I'll post up in a few when I have results again.

*EDIT* Rinsed it with tap water, got fresh water from the tank via my bulb dropper, and triple checked the bottles. It's turning orange again.

Has anyone else seen this happen? Is there something in particular that may have contaminated it?

I literally sat at my desk and did all 3 tanks in a row. I put a bowl of clean water and an empty cup down. Dump yucky water in the cup, and scoop out fresh water to rinse, shake vigorously, and dump in cup. Repeat until clean. Then do the next tank. The other two turned out fine, and all nitrite and nitrate tests were fine.

I'm leaning towards contaminated, but I can't imagine what, as I rinsed and rinsed and rinsed right at the sink (not in the bowl) before this last test.


Also, the tests are only a few months old, I've only had the tank for about 8 months and they're newer than it is.


**EDIT** I'm retesting the other tanks, to see if they turn orange now.

Can prazipro screw up ammonia test colors? It didn't do this last week, and there was prazi in there then.

If not the prazi pro, what will? Should I worry about the plec that is in that tank, if it is just that one tank that is turning orange?
 
Last edited:
I just finished a retest of the other two tanks.

There is a hint of orange, but only a slight twinge. Thus I think it is remnants from the qt tank.

Any guesses on what will cause this? I repeat my questions about whether this is the prazipro, or something else? I'm wondering if I should be worrying about the pleco that is in qt...
 
try taking some of the tank water from the qt ..dilluting it heavily and retest.
 
orange is also on the nitrate card..
 
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