Testing for Ammonia in the Freshwater & Saltwater Pools

[Tetra4CClyPtus]

Hey all, I conducted an experiment testing both the salt and freshwater for ammonia levels. Ammonia is what will slowly build up in the water over time as bacteria, substrate , food particles, and fecel matter gets kicked into the water. Ammonia can be very fatal to your crabs if the water has not been changed and the pools have not been cleaned. Risks-burn the crabs gills and slowly over time can even kill them. -breeds harmful mold and bacteria that can sicken the crabs.So the most importance is that you MUST keep your hermit crabs pools at all times. These pictures below show the clean freshwater and saltwater test results. So these indicators are a bright yellow/ top color on the card representing 0 ammonia Clean freshwater Clean saltwater Just to show that the indicator for ammonia free water is that it always has to be ammonia free to ensure that your crabs have constant access to clean water at all times. Levels below the line indicate that there have high ammonia levels and dangers go up. 1st day of crabitat sampling Freshwater pool Saltwater Pool *** Everyday is recommended, but the most every 3 Days *** that you should clean the pools and change the saltwater and freshwaterIs this topic already in this forum somewhere?? I couldn't find a topic related to this.

[Crabber85]

Yes this topic has been discussed as length on multiple other threads several of which can be found in the Archives under the Food and Water section.While we do recommend doing regular maintenance on the water dishes ie dumping the water out, wiping the dish down and re-filling with new clean water the frequency of this maintenance can vary from every day for dishes that hold less than a cup of water to every three days for larger dishes to once every two weeks for pools that hold a gallon or more as the volume of water directly controls the frequency at which you should be completely replacing the water and wiping the dishes down with a paper towel.Personally I only do this maintenance once every two weeks because my pools hold about a gallon of water each which gives me a little more lee way in this area.Another thing we have to consider is how many crabs we have, how large they are and how often they frequent the water dishes in combination with the dish sizes that dictates how often we must change out the water and clean the dishes.Ammonia which is a gas that is suspended in the water in a liquid state is surprisingly not as much of a concern with hermitcrabs as one might think, what we are more concerned with is the presence of bacteria like Staph, E-coli and Fecal Coliform which pose a risk both to us and to the crabs.If these bacteria are allowed to bloom to a certain population within the hermitcrabs drinking water they can cause intestinal issues and a suppressed immune system within the crabs.One bacteria that is not present within the hermitcrab or its enclosure is Salmonella we don't know why its not present but there have never been any positive results where this bacterial strain has ever been found unless the owner has mixed in a reptile or amphibian into the hermitcrabs enclosure which puts the crabs at greater risk of falling ill from exposure to this bacteria.

[Tetra4CClyPtus]

Ohh ok , soo do you like my experiment?? can this topic be put this in the archives and add in your information too? Or What you think?

[Crabber85]

Yes I do like your experiment monitoring the ammonia levels in the water allows us to have a good idea of which kinds of bacteria are flourishing if the ammonia level is low or in the safe range that typically means that we've done a good job at culturing and keeping the beneficial bacteria that break it down in to Nitrite and then Nitrate.If the Ammonia level is in the dangerous zone that means that the beneficial bacteria that should be breaking it down are not maintaining a good colony size if at all in the water which is a good indication that the water needs to be changed out more frequently and that some kind of aeration needs to be kept up like using a bubble stone and an air pump this will help to keep the harmful bacteria in check which tend to thrive in low oxygen levels this kind of bacterial family is known as anaerobic and most of the bacteria in this family die in the presence of high oxygen saturation because they have no tolerance for it.The beneficial bacteria family is Aerobic which means they need a high oxygen saturation level to thrive but are weaker than the anaerobic bacteria which leaves them vulnerable to being killed by the harmful bacteria which then allows the harmful strains to multiply to the tenth degree making the water toxic at best unless an ample oxygen supply is present in the water.For those of us who use larger pools that contain a half gallon of water or more can get away with filtering the water with an internal filter, running an air stone to keep the oxygen levels up and keeping back some of the water each time we do a full water change to seed the new water with to prevent the rise of harmful organisms in the water.Jedi Master Thrash has gone in depth on this subject doing experiments over the course of several months if memory serves.I would archive this but I have to get permission to do so as not any one admin can act alone on matters like this unfortunately.I'll be sure to mention this thread in the admin section and see what happens.

[Tetra4CClyPtus]

So where is Jedi's thread on this subject?? Hey , by the way, can I share your info that you replied with on another blog?

[Crabber85]

Sure you can share the info I provided, it's not mine as its general knowledge and in open source on Wikipedia.As for the thread by JMT I looked for it earlier in our Archive section but I could not locate it but I do know I've read it in the past, I'm thinking it might have been deleted during a software update a couple of years ago. This is on of the earlier posts by JMT where she first mentions having to filter her pools. Here is another thread where she talks about having to filter her water to keep the water quality up and makes the statement that cycling a half gallon of water is not possible.