PH problems and fish compatibility in a new tank

sarcare

sarcare

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Aug 3, 2006
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As a novice to the wonderful world of aquarium keeping, I think I may have made some mistakes. I'm trying to figure out enough to fix them without hurting my fish.

I have a twenty gallon tank, with six small tiger barbs (three albino and three regular) and five dwarf gouraimis. I wasn't aware of the whole range of cycling options so I only waited three days before putting nine fish in. It has mostly cycled by now, it is 0 ammonia, 0 Nitrite, and 20 Nitrate.

I bought a test kit Friday when one of the gourami's died and they had the water tested. The problem is the PH, which has varied between 7.8 and 8.4. Apparently my tap water is the same level, so I'm not sure what to do about it. I also bought some driftwood and some live plants.

My question is what can I do about the PH? I'm also having a hard time finding a good lfs, and went to four on Friday to try to find some solutions to why the fish died. I got a lot of different contradictory advice and got sold two chemicals, two plants, and a bunch of driftwood. The last place told me to change the water every day, but if the tap water has high PH that wont help!

Also, will the high PH impact my fish that are already in there? Nine of the eleven have been there for three and a half weeks without serious harm. The fish that died had only been there for three or four days--it just lay at the bottom and didn't move. None of the other fish were anywhere near--and the dead fish had no outward signs of distress.

In addition, I'd like opinions on whether my tank is overstocked--I know the barb-gourami combo isn't optimum, and there have been some nipped fins. I wanted to get a couple more barbs to lessen their aggression--they are really small right now so it seems like there would be room for two more small ones. But I also wanted to get a cory. Any suggestions?
 
take a cup of water from the tap and leave it out 12 hours and then test your water. what kind of test kit you using (dip sticks or liquid and what brand)? i wouldnt use chemicals to try to fix my tank. it could be you have little or no buffer in your tank. crushed coral would bring your buffer lvl up. you should get a kh test kit it will tell you how much of a buffer your water has. low or no buffer could cause your ph to swing like that which isnt good for the fish.
 
Test kit and Buffer

I bought a Freshwater Master Test Kit, the kind with chemicals--though for some reason it came with two bottles of the second solution for nitrite testing and not the second solution for the ammonia test. I'm planning on going to get the second bottle for the amonia test tomorrow. I'll pick up the kh test and something for a buffer--I'd not heard of that before. Thanks for the advice!
 
PH levels

Yes--I had it tested it Friday morning and it was 8.4 and then that evening it was 7.7 ish (in between colors) the next evening it was 8, then this afternoon it was back to 7.8. I changed the water saturday afternoon, so that might have something to do with the original change, and I added driftwood. Someone at one of the stores I went to suggested that the annacharis plants I have in there might mess with the PH levels--but I don't know if that is true.
 
cycling the tank will affect the PH.
it looks as though your tank is finished its cycle now though.
do you have a hardness test kit.
As advised by Mgamer test your water straight from the tap and about 12 hours later test again.
you do need to test for hardness both GH and KH.
i had the same problem on my 180g tank, i had a ph of around 7.0 with no buffer and after a week it would drop to around 6.0 so i had to add 1kg of crushed seashell to an external filter.
i also upped my filtration which helped.
i also try to not use chemicals and go for the more natural approach.
good luck
dixon
 
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