Help! My Ph has dropped a full 1.0!

[naturegrl]

I need advice quickly on what to do here, please. Yesterday I finally got my diy co2 running. My perameters before where, Amonia 0, nitrates 5, ph 8.3 I also did a 50% water change and thouroghly vacced the bottom right before.

Tonight I noticed my female GBR looked pretty pale. Never seen her like this. I've had her for maybe 3 weeks. So I did some tests and my ph is now 7.4!!! :eek3: Yikes!

My water hardness is very high and so is my KH-15. I thought my ph was going to be bullet-proof.

All of my fish are acting fine. Just noticed my GBR's color keeps fading in and out(the other male gbr's look normal)

My diy is putting out a steady stream of fine bubbles(fine airstone) which are kind of diffusing inside the mass of my my hornwort plant.

What should I do?

I put on the airstone full blast right away. Will that help? Pull the co2 line?

I realize this is a more desirable ph anyway, but how low will it go?

I'll stop there and wait for help....

Here's some stats:
55 gal. moderately planted, been up, cycled and running for about 4 months
about 2 wpg running about 8-10hrs/day
2 diamond tetras
1 dwarf gourami
4 german blue rams
4 black phantom tetras
4 black skirt tetras
1 schwartz cory (I know, I'm waiting to move some of these guys to a new tank and then add some friends for him)

Actually now my female gbr looks perfectly normal...

Thank you!

 

[rich311k]

That is a normal result of CO2 injection. You are doing fine. No need to do anything. The PH drop from CO2 does not really effect fish. Beside that GBR would like a PH below 6 so you have no worries.

 

[naturegrl]

Wow, that just seems like a huge drop in 24hrs. I put on the airstone last night because I wasn't sure what to expect. Nobody is gasping that I can tell.

Should I be worried about it dropping more? As you can tell I'm pretty nervous about the whole thing. I read loads on the diy and water chemistry subject before I gave it a try. After looking at that chart with kh/ph, I was off the chart and it looked like it was going to be very tough to get any co2 disolved in my water in the first place.

Anything I should be doing or watching out for? I would be a horrible gambler

 

[rich311k]

Keep testing the PH but right now you are really doing well with the injection. If it drops more I would be really impressed. I think you should find it will not go much lower.

 

[calivivarium1]

I agree with Rich, seeing a drop in PH is normal when adding additional CO2 to the water column.

 

[naturegrl]

Thanks so much, Rich. I can relax a little now. I'll test the ph again in a couple of hours.

 

[Cliff Mayes]

You are probably OK.

Normally pH goes down in a tank. The CO2 drives the pH down and sometimes just allowing the water to set for a while will lower the pH so everything is probably OK.

Expect the pH to get to the acid range and a, relatively, slow change is not harmful but you are quite correct in being alarmed about a full number change in pH. If you drop fish from one pH to another without a chance to adjust it can be harmful but an overnight change should not cause any problem.

Try to avoid making any attempts to adjust the tank pH. Fish are designed to adapt and pH changes in nature are the usual thing. Any fish that is used to tanks is more likely to adapt quickly to tank conditions. Any fish that has been acclimated to local conditions should be OK but extra care and checking of shipped fish from distant places should be practiced.

 

[rich311k]

PH change from CO2 is not the same as changing PH due to KH changes. A point swing or more is common in CO2 injected planted tanks with no harm to inhabitants.

I do agree don't adjust the PH any, the last thing she needs to do is raise that KH anymore.

 

[naturegrl]

Thanks guys.

I've never tried to mess with my ph. Seems too risky and too much fiddling. Besides with my Kh it would take quite a load of whatever to make it budge. I've always had a "rock" steady ph of 8.3, that and what I read in that chart...that's why I was so shocked to see such a change.

I guess my fine airstone and "Plant ladder" diffusion is working. Some of my plants are already streaming little lines of bubbles (pearling?).

 

[Cliff Mayes]

Just as an aside for anyone listening. I learned the hard way a long time ago about buffering. I was trying to get the pH to go down and kept adding stuff to drop the pH and the dumb thing wouldn't change untill all of a sudden the Ph went through the floor. I did not realize that the buffers were keeping the pH up until I overwhelmed the buffer and pow the pH changed big time. If you decide to fool wth pH be careful!