Well, in conjunction with my "feeding mistake" post, I do seem to be having some problems.
To recap, I have been doing 2, sometimes 3, 10-15% water changes weekly in a 30 gallon hex tank. I usually do not disturb all the gravel when doing the water changes. In fact, I usually only disturb about 1/6th of it or so, and the rest I just do a surface cleaning. I use Prime when I am conditioning tap water which is not supposed to affect pH, and I make sure to measure it correctly for the amount of water I am adding back to the tank. (However, RTR's aged water with no additives is sounding good to me right now). I have a fluval 4plus interior cannister filter. Up until this weekend it was fully cycled. I have regular natural colored gravel, some plastic plants, and a couple clean flower pots in this tank. Up until this weekend the stats on the water were 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, under 10 ppm nitrates, and pH of 7.2.
Yesterday I had 2 fish die, and I did two 30-40% water changes to get rid of ammonia, once early in the day and once in the evening. At the time the fish died it had been 4 days since my last water change. I vacuumed the gravel pretty extensively and afterwards my water became cloudy and I think I am experiencing a bacterial bloom (which happened when I got the tank too, but that is supposed to be more normal I think). Now I discover today that my pH has dropped BELOW 6.0, and my filter seems to have fully crashed. I have very high ammonia, though 0 nitrites so far. I don't know what my pH was yesterday before the water changes unfortunately.
I went to the LFS today to talk to the lady I trust there, and she doesn't feel like my small overfeeding issue was the problem. She also said I was probably working harder than necessary but she didn't think the water changes would have caused this either. She told me to be sure not to vacuum all my gravel deep at once because that destroys the beneficial bacteria and causes crashes... I'm not as sure about that information since I don't run a UGF type filter and I thought most my biological filtration was in the filter. However, except for yesterday I don't normally do that. I have decided to drop my water change schedule to 15% once a week, but this isn't solving my pH issue.
She says our tap water is extremely soft, and that it has very little buffering capacity. She gave me some pH buffer to add slowly to the tank today, and says for me NOT to do water changes for a full week so we can see if the pH goes back up. She says my fish will be able to handle the cycle even if I don't do water changes this week. This makes me incredibly nervous since my ammonia is so high (5.0-6.0 ppm), but currently they look healthy. She also said that the ammonia can't harm them at so low a pH, but I'm worried what will happen once the buffer starts working and the pH goes back up.
She said that recently she cycled a large tank and right at the offset the pH crashed hard. She did the same thing I'm doing by adding this buffer, and said after that the pH was corrected and has held without any additional help. She says if my pH crashes again after the buffer we'll add crushed coral to keep it steadier.
My 90 gallon that receives the same water change regimen that the 30 gallon did has 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, and under 10 ppm nitrates. It has a pH of 7.4. The 90 has been up and running for over 3 years though, and the 30 hex I am having problems with is under 6 months old.
My 10 gallon which is newer receives these water changes, but stays at 7.6. My 20 gallon stays at 7.8 but has crushed coral to bring up the pH/hardness for livebearers.
Any opinions on if I should be doing anything else or what to suspect for the pH crash? Could it really have been my water change schedule? Anything else I should check for?
To recap, I have been doing 2, sometimes 3, 10-15% water changes weekly in a 30 gallon hex tank. I usually do not disturb all the gravel when doing the water changes. In fact, I usually only disturb about 1/6th of it or so, and the rest I just do a surface cleaning. I use Prime when I am conditioning tap water which is not supposed to affect pH, and I make sure to measure it correctly for the amount of water I am adding back to the tank. (However, RTR's aged water with no additives is sounding good to me right now). I have a fluval 4plus interior cannister filter. Up until this weekend it was fully cycled. I have regular natural colored gravel, some plastic plants, and a couple clean flower pots in this tank. Up until this weekend the stats on the water were 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, under 10 ppm nitrates, and pH of 7.2.
Yesterday I had 2 fish die, and I did two 30-40% water changes to get rid of ammonia, once early in the day and once in the evening. At the time the fish died it had been 4 days since my last water change. I vacuumed the gravel pretty extensively and afterwards my water became cloudy and I think I am experiencing a bacterial bloom (which happened when I got the tank too, but that is supposed to be more normal I think). Now I discover today that my pH has dropped BELOW 6.0, and my filter seems to have fully crashed. I have very high ammonia, though 0 nitrites so far. I don't know what my pH was yesterday before the water changes unfortunately.
I went to the LFS today to talk to the lady I trust there, and she doesn't feel like my small overfeeding issue was the problem. She also said I was probably working harder than necessary but she didn't think the water changes would have caused this either. She told me to be sure not to vacuum all my gravel deep at once because that destroys the beneficial bacteria and causes crashes... I'm not as sure about that information since I don't run a UGF type filter and I thought most my biological filtration was in the filter. However, except for yesterday I don't normally do that. I have decided to drop my water change schedule to 15% once a week, but this isn't solving my pH issue.
She says our tap water is extremely soft, and that it has very little buffering capacity. She gave me some pH buffer to add slowly to the tank today, and says for me NOT to do water changes for a full week so we can see if the pH goes back up. She says my fish will be able to handle the cycle even if I don't do water changes this week. This makes me incredibly nervous since my ammonia is so high (5.0-6.0 ppm), but currently they look healthy. She also said that the ammonia can't harm them at so low a pH, but I'm worried what will happen once the buffer starts working and the pH goes back up.
She said that recently she cycled a large tank and right at the offset the pH crashed hard. She did the same thing I'm doing by adding this buffer, and said after that the pH was corrected and has held without any additional help. She says if my pH crashes again after the buffer we'll add crushed coral to keep it steadier.
My 90 gallon that receives the same water change regimen that the 30 gallon did has 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, and under 10 ppm nitrates. It has a pH of 7.4. The 90 has been up and running for over 3 years though, and the 30 hex I am having problems with is under 6 months old.
My 10 gallon which is newer receives these water changes, but stays at 7.6. My 20 gallon stays at 7.8 but has crushed coral to bring up the pH/hardness for livebearers.
Any opinions on if I should be doing anything else or what to suspect for the pH crash? Could it really have been my water change schedule? Anything else I should check for?
