Blackwater extract/ Instant Amazon

beezer720

AC Members
Nov 11, 2005
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Detroit
Does anyone know by experience or solid information whether or not adding blackwater extract to my larger tank would be beneficial? You can see the list of fish in my signature. I bought both Tetra's version and Instant Amazon for my Arowana. I have been thinking about adding it to the cichlid tank. I doubt it would really cause any problems for the SAs but I worry (its a longshot) about maybe stressing or adversely affecting the CAs somehow. Would this be a bad idea? If it's not a bad idea, would it just not prove beneficial enough for me to keep wasting my money on? Also, I bought a bottle of Ketapang Vital (made by same company as Instant Amazon) because it had a picture of an Aro (not Silver) on it and I might have been too blazed to actually read it thoroughly. I think it is basically the same concept as Instant Amazon, except for the Asian lakes and rivers. I have been adding this to my Aro tank as well as the amazon because I figured at the very least it has vitamins and other beneficial ingredients in it. Anybody with info I appreciate it and Happy New Year..
 
Blackwater extract does very little for your tank other than dying it yellowish. It does not bring Ph down much. I used the tetra brand stuff, but it did not seem to do anything. If you want the blackwater look in your tank, I recommend peat moss in your filter, it lowers your Ph, keeps it constant and improves the color of fish.
 
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Sly what kind of fish? Have you kept for a while and had decent experience/time with them with the extract and without? Do you know if it has increased the vibrancy of their colors or the apparent health/happiness of the fish? Ljse, I wasn't really looking to lower the ph (right where I want it) and don't really care about the yellow tint. I have just heard over the years that for certain fish, ie arowana, that it is a very good and beneficial thing to add to the water because it contains various vitamins/minerals/other trace elements that add to the fishes color, comfort level, and ultimately health. And I thought about peat, ljse, same questions I asked sly about black water, have you seen this to be true with peat? I actually just saw a show on discovery highlighting the waters of amazonia and a large portion was on arowana, and some talked about the peacock bass and I saw a few other fish like geophagus (dont know which ones, not too familiar with these fish) and obviously they all live in the same water. It was on HD and when underwater footage from say the carribean is in HD it is unreal how clear it is. The underwater footage in the amazon was definately noticeably yellow and dark. So once again I figure if this is what their water is like in the wild it has to be beneficial in the aquarium right? I guess you never know until you try, therefore I ask you great people. And by the way I have seen on this site i think and other various people say in their SA tanks they have the bottom lined with dead leaves and people argue over whether this is smart/right or not. Let me tell you thats exactly what they bottom of these waters looked like, so if you wanna try it out and go through the hassle of it, I'm sure it awesome and the fish would love it.
 
The leaf method is probably the best but its also a lot more work than peat and you cant remove it as easily if you need to.
 
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