Mess with the water chemistry or not?

[yhbae]

My tap water comes out as follows:

pH = 7.5 (well, normal pH one says 7.6 and high pH one says 7.4!)
KH = 72ppm
GH = not measured yet

For shellies, would this be ok? An assurance from someone would be nice.

While at it, what about other Lake Tang species? I do remember that Lake Malawi is less alkaline hence species from that lake was more adapt to lower pH/GH/KH.

Once I start to mess with water chemistry I am stuck forever, so if I can get away without it, I'd like to go that way.

Thanks.

 

[jpappy789]

Hard to say without the GH...to be honest, unless you are getting wild caught specimens, the fish will be more lenient with water chemistry.

 

[yhbae]

Yeah my testing kit is 6 years old and GH one seems to be broken. KH turned water color at 4 drops but GH one did not even after 20 drops! I don't see any expiring date on the kit so I'm not sure what's going on. I doubt this water has > 360ppm GH...

Isn't KH and GH levels roughly similar for most water?

 

[Pittbull]

My water tests out at 400 GH 8.0 PH pretty much liquid rock great for africans so that may be a true value for your water..

The recommended value would be 200 to 400 for riftlake cichlids your in between the value so it should be fine.. if that is the actual reading..

 

[yhbae]

My pH is only around 7.5 though. I doubt my GH is 400ppm+... I am going to get my hand on another GH tester and see if it makes any difference.

 

[Rbishop]

I would just leave it as is. However, a 6 yr old liquid test kit bothers me personally.

 

[yhbae]

I would just leave it as is. However, a 6 yr old liquid test kit bothers me personally.

Oh that's because I used to have aquariums 6 years ago... I stopped about 3 years ago when I relocated to a new city. Only now I am thinking of going back into this hobby again. I can assure you, I will refresh my equipment again when I get back into the hobby. I was just testing my tap water to see what kind of water I was dealing with using some of my old stuff...

 

[yhbae]

I bought the new kit and measured GH and KH again.

This time:

KH = 5 (90ppm)
GH = 9 (162ppm)

pH still reports the same - 7.4/7.6 depending on high/normal bottle.

Personally I think this might be just enough to not mess with the water chemistry and use it with Lake Tang/Malawi species...

 

[AfroCichlid]

Use some crushed coral in your setup. You could use it as substrate or stick it in the filter. Should help buffer your pH a bit.

 

[Pittbull]

What afro said use a reef base substrate like crushed coral, aragonite sand maybe a few pieces of Texas Holey Rock, this will aid in the hardness staying in the range you need it to also your fish will thank you as well, well if you go the Malawi/Tanganyika route that is..

A good substrate is Caribsea aragonite substrates and they have a lot of varieties to choose from including crushed coral down to suger size sand with different colors..