My tank finally cleared up but my ph went down to 6 and my hardness is off the charts. Is this common after using Aquarium plants substrate? the tank is not yet planted because my lights have not arrived yet. I've just been running the filter now for 2 days because the tank was very cloudy. Will the hardness go back to normal (my tap water is naturally soft):headbang2:
substrate problem?
- Thread starter gonsouth
- Start date
Aquariumplants.com's substrate is Soil Master Select. It has a high CEC (cation exchange coefficient) and therefore will strip KH out of the water column. This will result in a drop in pH as well. It is normal when using that substrate. It will continue to drop KH for a year or so. If you want your KH to be at a certain level, you can add baking soda to get it back up to that level, but it's not necessary. The pH drop is fine, depending on what fish you are planning to keep.
The ph dropped all the way to 5 and I'm going to put white clouds in, so I might add the baking soda. My well water is very soft and acid. It runs between 4 and 5ph. I have a treatment system on my house water that raises the ph to 7.6 or 7.8. I put half treated water and half well water in the tank. I'm thinking I should have put all treated water in the tank. The white clouds are in a 7G planted tank with plain gravel and it's doing very well with the half and half system. I am closing that tank down and transfering everything into the 20L, which will be planted as soon as I get my lights. they're on the way. and I should get them maybe today.
You can add the baking soda or you can just do your next water change with all/more treated water.
thankyou for all your help. If I knew that Soil master would drop the ph, I probably would have selected a different substrate. I'm going to do what you say and just add the tap water. I will not put fish in until the ph goes up. My 7G tank's ph is about 7.5.