wonky pH, bad ammonia ???

colinsk said:
If we knew a carbonate (alkalinity) reading was it would be much easier to guess. Also the alkalinity of your water supply would be helpful.
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Alkalinity? And here I thought "alkaline" meant high pH. Sorry, I'm clearly not familiar with all the terminology yet. If you mean gH/KH, I don't have those tests. It's on the list of things to get. I was hoping not to have to buy more stuff so soon---I just ordered a lot of equipment, etc, that hasn't even arrived yet---but that list is getting kind of long so I may have to shell out in the near future.
 
cellodaisy said:
Sounds like I do need to place that second order... Le sigh... I'm have a fantastic time learning about all this stuff, but I feel like I'm bleeding money. Please tell me it slows down at some point?
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It's an expensive hobby to first get into. Once everything stabilizes, it gets a lot cheaper, and if you're really good at it, you can make some money back by selling what you produce.

It sounds to me that your kH is low, and not holding any pH. The pH from your tap is high, and without a high enough kH, the pH will crash in the tank that has 1) drift wood 2)peat moss 3)high bio-load(like your turtle).

The nitrification process, aka Nitrogen Cycle, will naturally lower pH. Everytime an ammonia molecule is converted to nitrite, an H+ is released, making the water more acidic.

Increasing the kH, will stabilize your pH and not cause it to crash so often. Sodium Bicarbonate(Baking Soda) and Crushed Coral is the easiest way.
 
This thread reminded me that I should check on my fishless-cycle tank, and indeed it was stalled with a pH of under 6. I had to add 3 teaspoons of Arm & Hammer baking soda to raise it to 7.2 pH. The ammonia is 1.0 ppm and the Nitrite was also 1 ppm. I'll be sure to check again tomorrow and hopefully find these readings to be 0.

This particular tank has been a "life saver" for me, as it donated a sponge filter filled with bacteria for an impulse Discus purchase.
 
Stop thinking too much about pH. It doesn't matter much. KH is the important one here.
 
cellodaisy said:
Alkalinity? And here I thought "alkaline" meant high pH. Sorry, I'm clearly not familiar with all the terminology yet. If you mean gH/KH, I don't have those tests. It's on the list of things to get. I was hoping not to have to buy more stuff so soon---I just ordered a lot of equipment, etc, that hasn't even arrived yet---but that list is getting kind of long so I may have to shell out in the near future.
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You are right, the way it's used in reference to something that is not pH but is somewhat related is confusing. The definition of alkali supports both the pH definition we know, and the way they use it (and I can't remember if they use it to measure carbonate or minerals).
 
Okay, I think know what I need to do for my main tank now (gH/KH testing & buffering), but I'm still confused about the two new tanks. If cycling usually pushes the pH down, why did mine go up?

I did clean out and refill them last night but I haven't put in anything besides dechlor. I may go with ye olde fish food method since my ammonia was a disaster. I just wish I could figure out what was going on with the pH last time so I can try not to do it again.

KarlTH - I know you said to focus on KH, not pH, but I don't have a KH test right now so pH is all I have to go on.
 
pH can go up because ammonia is alkaline (it accepts a proton to become NH4+). It can also go up as dissolved CO2 in the tap water gases off. It can go up because of calcareous substrates. That's the reason for needing to focus on KH; I wish the master test kits included it.
 
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