Please help!!!

S

schenko

AC Members
Jul 3, 2005
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I am new to the hobby completeley... I want to get the water right for the fish and I am hoping someone might feel sorry for me & help me get started!

I am a quick learner & an information junkie, so I have had no problem learning & understanding what I need in order to have the fish I want. I have well water that gives me a very low pH (6.0) from the tap with 1gH and <1kH.

I purchased a 45 gal (tall) tank & have the undergravel filter with a Tetra Whisper 60 filter on the back of the tank and a Rena 300 to supply my 2 tubes with airstones. I also purchased a 36" bubble wand & hooked that up to a separate Air-Tec pump. I have only put 3 small fish in it thus far. The fish I want (& have) thrive in a gH of 3-6 and a kH of 6-8 with a pH of 6.8-7.2. I have successfully raised the hardness to 4-5, and the kH to 5. The problem is my pH has risen to 7.2-7.5. If I do a water change, the gH & kH go down again without the treatments I used to raise them. If I add Seachem pH 7.0 to the water, the kH goes down. When I add the Buffer Up - the pH goes up.

I was reading somewhere on pH & kH and water movement/air circulation has an impact on pH?? Is this problem solved as easily as turning off the bubble wand? The current in the tank does seem swift, but I think that may be caused more by the tubes & back filter. I'm not sure. What do I do?

CAN ANYONE HELP ME PLEASE?
 
Welcome to AC and to the hobby. One of the first things you will learn, and wow, I get to be the first to tell you, is that there are many myths and misconceptions in this hobby. pH is just the beginning of them. Sometimes, pH can be an issue, but most often that is for breeders. Some rams are just fine in a higher pH and that is the pickiest fish I saw listed on your other thread. Personally, I would leave the chemicals alone. They can and do cause more problems than they are worth. As RTR (a member here and if your an information junkie, please look at his posts. He's brilliant and a long time aquarist) is fond of saying, "Fish can't read pH". A stable pH is by far more preferable than the "right" pH. Fish can adapt to differnt pHs and I am willing to bet that most fish are not kept in the "ideal" pH and do just fine. So, don't sweat it. Just adapt your fish slowly and I think the numbers you listed for your regular water will be more than adequate. In fact, I'd kill for your water to come out of my tap, but instead I get this massively hard, alkaline water full of minerals. Icky.
 
Do I stop the "buffer up" and "tank hard" treatments???
 
Well, before I say yes, just what is your water like out of the tap? pH, GH and KH? Are there only 3 fish in at present, and is the tank cycled? How long has it been set up?
 
I have from the tap <1gH, <1kH, and a pH of 6.0. Also, does the bubble wand affect anything? There are only 3 small fish (cherry barbs). They seem fine. They are eating and playing. I don't know if it is cycled or not. It has been running for about 2.5 weeks, and for the first week I put "Stability" and "Cycle" in the tank with Tetrasafe water conditioner. I have put in Seachem pH 7.0 since then, and also the buffer up and tank hard. Does this affect the back-of-tank filter with its biological filtration?? Thanks!
 
Okay, a few things:

After 2.5 weeks, unless you seeded this tank heavily with filter squeezings from another tank, actually used a filter from an established tank or something else, the tank is most likely not cycled. You should concentrate hard on that first. I recommend reading the cycle sticky in that newbie forum. It's one of the first 5 or 6 threads, usually. Great information on just what the cycle is, why it is absolutely vital to your tank, and how to make sure you get there. You'll need ammonia, nitrate, and nitrate test kits. Also, if you haven't already, stop using cycle. It can actually set back your cycle because o how it works.

Your pH is a little soft, but really, with the fish you were looking at, that's not too bad at all. Your buffers are low and that can lead to bad pH swings. There are natural ways to raise your KH and GH like crushed coral. I'll let someone else comment on that, as I said earlier, my water is woefully hard and so I have absolutely no practical experience with raising KH and GH, since my water is basically liquid rock. The problem with chemicals is that over time, the cost a lot and they are not consistent and require a lot of monitoring. With some of the more natural cures, like adding crushed coral, you get a steadier, more stable environment, once you reach your desired level. Hope that helps, and, check those stickies in the newbie forum. You can learn a ton from reading those threads, I promise.
 
Harlock, I was going to suggest the crushed coral when I was on here a bit ago, but I had to run out to the grocery store just then to try and beat the rain. (Rain- 1, Me- 0)

Here in this area of SC, the water comes out of the tap just like yours, schenko. The crushed coral in the filter will help to slowly bring up all the water parameters you are trying to adjust with chemicals now and it is totally safe to use...no worries about pH swings and hardness, etc. While your fish will be fine at the pH you have now, I like having mine a bit closer to neutral just to have a little more wiggle room should there be an increase in nitrates. If you don't want to use crushed coral and you just let the pH be, don't slack off on the partial water changes because when nitrates build up over time, pH drops too. It will stay close to the pH out of the tap if you're good about not skipping them.
 
Your tap water is high Co2, air circulation technically does not effect Ph, but it does have an influence on co2 levels which effect Ph. Essentially once the water is released from the pipes, the gasses in the water will equalize with Atmosphere. As co2 levels drop Ph levels rise. To get an accurate test, put some of your tap water in a shallow bowl and let it sit overnight then test Ph. This will give you your true Ph level, not the level you get straight from the tap.
With a KH of 1 and a Ph of 6.0 you are at roughly 30 PPm co2. Your water should stabilize at roughly 7.0 ph with 1 DKH.

Now IMO a tank with low KH is very prone to problems. If it remains steady between water changes you are better off not to mess with it. if it lowers then you can use crushed coral (a little in the filter) to counteract the consumption of Kh and keep your tank stable.
As mentioned unless you are planning to breed softwater fish, Ph isn't a big deal as long as it is stable. the higher your Kh level the the more stable your tank will be. Most folks with planted tanks and co2 injection consider KH 3 to be the minimum.
Kh does directly effect Ph. So if you raise your Kh you will see an increase in PH. A Kh of 3 will put you in the range of 7.4- 7.6 PH and your fish will be quite happy at that level.

Cycle is not a good thing! The bacteria it contains will eat ammonia, but will not live long, and will add to the pollutants in your tank. The only bacteria in a bottle that gets good reviews is Bio-Spira. With three small fish, water changes and patience should do the trick. It takes some time to cycle the tank (4-6 weeks) and you will want to watch ammonia and nitrite levels very closely. Feed next to nothing, and try to keep ammonia and nitrite both below 0.5 ppm at all times. Read up on cycling, and get all of the info you can. Fishless cycling is really superior, but if you are careful and informed you can do a fishy cycle without hurting fish.

You HOB with it's bio-filtration will not be effective until you have "cycled" Bio-filters are simply bacteria beds that house the bacteria we want to eat ammonia, and nitrite. They will take time to estabilish no matter what type of filter you use.

As far as the bio-filtration, your UGF will inevitably be the primary bio-filter, but any surface will colonize bacteria and serve as a bio-filter. UGF's are great filters but are often mis-understood and can lead to problems if not maintained. Here is one article link everyone should read. If you have additional questions about UGF's let me or others here know. Fair warning, many folks hate undergravels, and aren't afraid to say so. I personally won't run a tank without them as a rule. They are not evil, but like any filter if they aren't maintained they will cause problems.
http://www.aquasource.org/CMS/modul...ns&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=17&page=1

As far as hardness effecting bio-filters, it will have no significant effect in the range of normal freshwater operations. Low or depleted Kh will adversely effect a bio-filter when the Ph crashes. but as long as you have any kh your ph should be high enough for your bio-filter. Just an FYI, the process by which your bacteria convert ammonia to nitrite and then to nitrate is the same process that consumes your Kh. In most cases water changes will be enough to deal with this, but if you start with extremely soft water, you are may have to adjust your routine to keep the Kh from depleting.

The seachem products are not always a good idea. PH-up is sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) which works just fine and does what it is suposed to do. Crushed coral (calcium carbonate) will do the same thing slower. I use both, but much prefer the crushed coral. Baking soda is fast and thus dangerous to add directly to a tank. Fish don't like rapid changes in chemistry. Crushed coral is slow (painfully slow to be exact) and therefore allows you more room for error, and makes changes in your tank at a pace that will not bother your fish.


HTH
Dave
 
Please excuse me for butting in on your thread, but I have a question on the same topic. If you use crushed coral(you say it is very slow) and do a 50% water change does that drop your PH significantly? I have no access to crushed coral so when I do a water change I have just been using baking soda. I put half my new water in then half of my jug that has the baking soda mixed up in and then the remaining half of water and the remaining half of baking soda water. Do you think that I'm stressing my fish this way??? They appear fine. My water from the tap(after sitting overnight is 6.2), I have been maintaining my tank at 7.2.
 
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