Bringing down ammonia

Hello all. I measured my levels a few days ago and all my levels were 0 (ph 7.2) apart from ammonia; my ammonia is raised so for the past few days I have been doing a 20% water change every day to try and bring it down. Ammonia is 0.50 from what I can tell but I am a bit colour blind and struggle a lot with greens so I keep getting myself in a bit of a state thinking it's as high as 1, but it's definitely not higher than one and looks closer to 0.50. I'll post a picture after work if people desire, main point is the ammonia is raised slightly and needs to come down, it doesn't seem like the level has really changed with these water changed however like I say I wouldn't detect a subtle change in colour. I was wondering what advice you can give me to bring it down? I'm a bit worried these daily water changes are stressing Ruto out even more.

It looks like your tank is not cycled. For your tank to be cycled, bacteria needs to be present to break down the Ammonia and Nitrites into Nitrates. Ammonia and Nitrites are lethal to Axolotl, Nirates being less toxic. During cycling the beneficial bacteria will colonize your tanks surfaces such as substrate, ornaments, filter, and begin to feed on the Ammonia turning it into Nitrites, then another type of bacteria will break down the Nitrites into Nitrates. The bacteria is known as a biofilter, as it filters the ammonia and nitrites into less harmful nitrates. Since your nitrites and nitrites are 0 it seems there is no presence of bacteria.

Read these links on cycling:
Caudata Culture Articles - Cycling
Caudata Culture Articles - Water Quality

I've read them, I perhaps didn't understand right from the first time, so could I take a plant and an ornament for example from my mums tank which houses mountain minnows which are freshwater and use that to colonise my tank?

Potentially yes, it would seed your tank with bacteria and speed up the cycling process. As long as those fish have no parasites or diseases as moving the plant and ornament could carry something across. How long has the other tank been established? Perhaps someone else could shed light on that situation since I have no experience in that area other than what I have read.

Other tank has been up and running for about 4 months there's no parasites that we are aware of they've actually never had any problems not even white spot so hopefully that will help

Just as an fyi, cycling doesnt happen overnight especially at the cooler temperature ranges used for most amphibians. In general it usually takes 3-6 weeks for a tank to be completely cycled. If your animals are healthy they shouldnt be too stressed as long as you keep the ammonia/nitrite <1.0ppm. This will require frequent testing and water changes to accomplish. Being disturbed briefly by a water change is much less detrimental than soaking in higher levels of ammonia/nitrite 24hrs a day. The less food introduced to the system means less ammonia produced so keep feeding to a minimum and remove any uneaten material. When doing water changes keep in mind that whatever percentage of water volume you are removing will also reduce the ammonia/nitrite by the same percentage. Live plants, in my opinion, are the best way to ease cycling. They introduce more beneficial bacteria and some even feed directly on ammonia/nitrite, so this helps to keep levels from spiking. Aquatic hornwort (Ceratophyllum sp.) are my personal favorites. They are free floating and feed readily on ammonia/nitrite. They are also fast growing so that in turn means more ammonia/nitrite removed. Remember, patience and persistence is very important when cycling.

Good luck!

I've got some of that from my mums tank actually she has appeared stressed since I got her actually her gills are curved forwards and that just hasn't changed but she's active and eating, filter is low and disrupted by an artificial plant, I just don't really know what else to do to help her. I'll be checking daily and I'll keep doing partial water changes every day too, I think I'm just concerned about the water changes because she already seems stressed. She did look like that before I brought her home though.

I've been removing uneaten food an hour after putting it in also, but she does usually eat it all, I don't give her a huge amount of food either because I did bear in mind that would increase ammonia before the tank is cycled

Sounds like youre doing the right things. Water changes do cause stress but are by far the lesser of the 2 evils. Now all you need is time.

Well I'm just glad I'm on the right track now since putting the plants in from my
Mums tank she's loving it having a good explore and climbing and swimming about the plants