Hard Water

[Sam Puter]

Alright i have a 55 g fish tank and have 4 white cloud mountain minnows, 4 silver tips, 1 tiger barb, 2 clown loaches, and 2 silver dollars, and two plecos. And i know that i have very hard water and i was wondering if there was anything you could do to help the hardness go down? i have just been adding water to the tank cuz i already know that when you have to fill up the tank every 3 days you have hard water because all pure water evaporated.So to repeat what i want to know, is there any way to make the hardness of water go down?

[Larissa]

you could try adding water that peat moss has been soaking in. or add peat to your filter. if you can afford it you can get a reverse osmosis filter and mix the ro water with your regular water. or purchase distilled water but that's expensive. i personally wouldn't mess with it at all. i have very hard water and my angels and tetras seem to be fine. just how hard is your water? have you tested it?

[Sam Puter]

yeah my hardness was like 300 ppm at least thats what it said on my test strip.

[Kasakato]

Theres the problem. ITs the test strips. They will offten give you miss reads. Liquid test kits are better. For GH and KH heres the best one: http://www.bigalsonline.com/catalog/product.xml?product_id=19377;category_id=3239;pcid 1=3233;pcid2=

[Kissofthegorami]

Water hardness is actually one of the least critical elements of water chemistry for most fish. The only reliable way to soften it is with reverse osmosis. Why not go for fish that love hard water, african cichlids or livebearers?

[doom_machine]

i have this stuff called proper ph 7.0, it does really work but is cloudy and leaves dust behind, i can also really feel the difference when i put my hand in the water i dont think i never felt softwater before that but the fish seem fine with hardwater too

[Kasakato]

DO not use that stuff!! Its usless and bad for your fish. Proper pH will raise the pH to 7, and then when it wears off in a few hours is back down to 7. THis change stresses out fish, and is not good at all. ITs better to leave the pH where it was before. How do you "fell" hard or soft water?

[Watcher74]

My tap water is 303 ppm. Fish are doing fine. This includes South American fish that are found in very soft/acidic water.

If it ain't broke, don't try and fix it and end up killing all your fish.

[Sam Puter]

so what the majority is saying is just to leave the water as is?? :huh:

[daveedka]

so what the majority is saying is just to leave the water as is??

Yup !!!!

I work my butt off to get my hardness up to the range that you are quoting. bottom line is my plants and snails don't like soft water, and my fish don't care at all if it's hard or soft.
Dave

[Sam Puter]

thank you to everyone who posted