"Hank Barta" wrote in message
news:PS7Xb.296918$I06.3042025@attbi_s01...
Michi Henning wrote:

I suspect that 40ppm or more wouldn't be unusual in many fish shops.

Why would you think that? Every time fish are sold from a tank,
some of the water is sold with them and replenished at the end of
the day. Except for tanks that hold low volume sellers, there is
probably about 25% water change in these tanks on a weekly basis.

Also the shops are more likely to underfeed than overfeed their
stock.

What sort of conditions would be necessary to get ammonia up to
40ppm?

Michi's 40ppm quotation is regarding NO3. I don't know of anything which
can live in 40ppm NH3 (ammonia).

Regarding LFS tanks, do some measurements. My tanks (LFS) are zero
NH3/4, zero NO2 and zero NO3. I run high fish loads, but have huge
biological filters, tons of plants and have 4 small water changes done
per day automatically. I don't think there are 2 stores which will be
the same. Take an empty bottle to the LFS and get a water sample of
their tank (because you want to match your water parameters to theirs ;~)
and then take it home and test it.

NetMax