Raising KH and GH

Ghostshrimp55

AC Members
Sep 30, 2005
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Anyone have any good suggestions on how to raise KH and GH? My tank's water is about 2 degrees KH and 3 degrees GH. It's a little soft, no? The tank is undergoing a fishy cycle and I was just wondering if I should try to get these numbers up or leave them alone? The pH is slightly above 7.

Thanks everyone.
 
I would leave it alone unless you have fish that absolutely need hard alkaline water. Just do your regular water changes to ensure that your keep replacing the buffers and you should not have a problems with the ph crashing.
 
Leave it until you understand it better. With a ph of around 7 you're pretty much in neutral territory. There's no reason to mess with that unless you want to raise or breed a fish that needs a very specific ph.

Generally, the only other reason you'd mess with it is to raise the kh to offer more of a buffer so your tank's ph isn't as easily affected. However, I would advise against playing with this until you have a better understanding of how changing one element of your water will affect all the others.

RTR had a great article on Tom Griffin's site that explained the basics of water chemistry as it pertains to aquariums very well. Unfortunately I think the site is down now. Maybe he or others could guide you to another resource.
 
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