dear water company...

Apologies for being off topic.

12 Volt Man said:
but if you have a tank with a pH of say 6.0 and do a 50% water change with hard tap water of a pH of 7.8 or so, your pH will likely go up at almost a full point..which CAN have a detrimental affect, and quickly sometimes.....
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My tank pH swings from 6.6 to 7.6 in under 10 minutes every week when I do a water change. I've been doing this for about more then 5 years now. I've yet to see any effect on fishes health. To be clear this is a CO2 injected tank and the waters are identical as far as kH and gH.

12 Volt Man said:
a pH test kit.

its much cheaper than a conductivity meter :)

it is a simple indicator of what you are saying:

that is the increase in TDS and the accompanying osmotic shock (rapid change in osmotic pressure) that causes all the problems.

its easier to use pH as an indicator of what is happening with the TDS increase/decrease from the change....
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The pH (a measurement of the ratio of positively and negatively charged hydrogen ions) is only loosely related to TDS and hardness. To suggest to newbies that measuring pH is a way to avoid osmotic shock seems like a recipe for disaster to me. General hardness and carbonate hardness (significant contributors to TDS) test kits are readily available and quite adequate for this purpose.
 
To all those saying pH swings have a detrimental effect on fish:

Canuck has a great point. Tanks injected with Co2 see drastic drops in pH within a single day. But do the fish suffer? No, because TDS stays the same. A fish keeper doesn't need a TDS meter (which are available) as long as they are able to measure GH and KH, which are FAR more closely related to TDS than pH is. Even then you should only be concerned about stability. Specific levels are often not required for most setups.

To the OP:

make sure you have some way of adding minerals and buffering to the RO water...fish can't survive in pure H2O.
 
how do you go about adding minerals? is this the hang crushed coral in the filters thing? i know for my puffer, an ro system will be handy once i bump him up to full marine. will it really affect the freshwater fish?
 
ok. got it.

on a bright note: the L239 is back to normal yesterday evening, eating and everything. *sighs*

once things get stable again i need to go get more congos :/
 
jenn let me once again express my sympathies for your loss. Your thread has (again) revived the pH/TDS convo. and I am thoroughly pleased every time I see it surface.

Blue, I assure you we all thoroughly appreciate your desire to promote safe acclimation practices for "newbs" and to streamline responsible care for specimens regardless of local water characteristics :thumbsup: However, Karl's initial comments re: the fallacy of pH shock do not promote poor acclimation procedures; they merely comment on the extremely important and often ignored TDS parameter. Fixating on pH values (and trying to adjust them) often lead to significant stress on tank life. Furthermore, this parameter is frequently monitored (versus an acclimation event) due to the commonly included pH test in most liquid/strip kits and is far more likely to be a peristent source of concern and interest for "newbs". pH can not serve as a reliable proxy or indicator for TDS. The aquarium industry continues to make a mint off of pH adjust products due to lack of fundamental understanding.

Reef, you were concealing your sarcasm so "well". Karl answers your follow-up questions very nicely, but let me quote you here:

"He said it is a myth, hence he says its incorrect and it does not have an effect on fish..."

Really? Are you sure he said that? If you're looking for an "irresponsible" comment, look no further.
 
"The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will begin using ammonia next month to treat drinking water in the District and Virginia, a move that officials believe will reduce the risk of cancer linked to a lifetime of drinking chlorinated water.

The new treatment, which is to be announced today, also is expected to make drinking water smell less like a swimming pool when customers tilt a glass of it to their noses.

But the addition of a new treatment chemical will require some special precautions for people who own fish tanks and patients who need kidney dialysis treatment. "

I have to say when I read this, it just left me with my mouth wide open in stunning amazement! Do you really think they believe long term ingestion of ammonia will have no long term ill-effects on people and animals? But....they're probably safe for about 20-25 years since it'll take that long to notice the bad effects and to conduct a zillion studies on it.

Inkyjenn, so sorry for your losses! Nothing sucks more than having something totally unexpected and out of our control or understanding come up and whack us like this! Sorry, but I don't see how you can suddenly have ammonia in your tap water if the water company didn't put it in there. I've never heard of ammonia leaching from pipes so.....let's see, where oh where could the ammonia have been introduced!!! Hang in there! And stop drinking your tap water! I don't drink my tap water since the chlorine seems to affect me adversely.
 
im willing to bet the water company did not divulge totally truthful information to me whether it was deliberate or not
 
inkyjenn said:
im willing to bet the water company did not divulge totally truthful information to me whether it was deliberate or not
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have you conversed with anyone else in your area about this? perhaps there are more cases of illness because of the water...
 
I'm so happy to hear that the rest of your fish have made it through the ordeal so far.

I hope that you are feeling better as well.

Good luck with everything, and so sorry for your losses.
 
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