Woopsie....

[bre]

I had a friend come around today who has bought my pep colony off me but has to set up a tank first. So he came around to do the tests on the water so he had an idea of how to set up his tank.

Temp...24c - think I need to locate a heater....
pH.......4.3 - ummm......

Silly me put it down to the driftwood in the tank :whistle:
So we decided to test the tap water....

Tapwater pH.......somewhere in the low 7's.

Made us wonder why the huge difference and decided to test all the tanks. Got results between 3.8 and 5. So I thought, he must have a faulty digital pH tester and went and got mine. Exactly the same results. I've never had to add anything to my water when I do water changes only the dechlorinator. I don't know what the pH has been previously as that was hubby's job up until a few weeks ago when he started working away but it seems odd that every tank in my house has a pH that low. The tank which is on 3.8 has electric yellows and blue rams in it....and the tank closer to 5 has my breeding colony of Frontosa in it (no wonder they stopped breeding :wb....really not happy.

Anyone got any ideas on why all tanks would be so low when the tap water is quite a bit higher?

I'm no good on water issues...

 

[FF MkII]

Wow that is low, even some apistos (that love soft, low PH water) have higher PH than that in the wild. The only thing i can think of is the wood having an effect but even that shouldnt bring it down that low. Is it stable?

 

[bre]

I have no idea if it's stable or not. I only just realised tonight it was down that low. There is only driftwood in 2 of the tank systems, so the other's don't have any and one of the ones that has none is the lowest out of all of them.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
Bre, could you put some shells or coral sand in the tanks? Limestone would do, but shells, oyster shell chicken grit or coral sand would be better, as the aragonite form of calcium carbonate is more soluble than calcite.

It is a funny measurement pH, because it is just a "snap-shot" at the time you take the reading, if you don't have much carbonate buffering the pH will be unstable, and a little addition of any acid (like the carbonic acid from dissolved CO2) will cause the pH to crash. The problem with adding chemical salts to your water is that the lack of buffering in the water will lead to the pH potentially shooting up as soon as you add them. The higher pH in the tap water is because a carbonate source has been added to the water to stop it dissolving lead, copper etc from the water pipes.

If you aim for at least KH4, the pH should become much more stable.

Malawis and Tangs come from very hard, alkaline waters which are inherently stable (they are huge lakes) so they don't react very well to changes in temperature, KH, GH or pH.

You can raise GH/KH with bought salt mix, or you can make your own from bi-carbonate of soda and Epsom salts (and a calcium carbonate source).

This is a random link from Google, but it tells you what you need to know.
<http://www.petfrd.com/forum/articles.php?action=viewarticle&artid=20>.

cheers Darrel

 

[bre]

Thanks for all that info Darrel
I used to make my own salts for the frontosa's so just have to dig out that recipe again, it was a really good and easy one.
at the moment, I'm stuck at home with no car, no shops nearby and nothing to add to the tanks so they will have to stay that way until friday when Mark comes home from working away. So i'll check the pH periodically over the next 2 days as well get the master test kit out.

 

[Irene0100]

oh dear, can you do some water changes in the meantime?
if ph gets very low it kills the bacteria on the filter then you have amonia problems etc. -I had a tank wipe out like that!

try adding some egg shells for calcium buffer, its a good natural thing. just break them up a bit.

I found I was getting ph crashes from too much wood, or in some cases too many snails (they use the calcium in the water to make their shells.)

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
Irene wrote:

try adding some egg shells for calcium buffer

that is a good call, egg shell will do very well if you can't get out.

This is a better link to an article about buffering and water hardness, than the first one I posted:
http://www.wetwebmedia.com/fwsubwebindex/fwh2oquality.htm

cheers Darrel

 

[bre]

I'm out of eggs aswell lol......the cupboards are bare

pH is definately NOT stable. It was testing at 6.2 in a tank where it was 5 yesterday.

 

[FF MkII]

Not good

 

[MiB1986]

not sure if it will help but in marine

if my ph drops i put powerheads up at the water so in effect they create like waves and turberlance, also remove tank lid and open lots of windows and this will increase the gas exchange! over many hours it pulls the PH back to about 7.8 which is probabily a little too high for fresh but fine for marine, but if there is no coral sand or live rock etc... it should be fine.

No chemical adding just releasing trapped stel air, this time of year is terrible for marine as most people have their windows closed etc... and if you go on marine forums your find loads of people with PH crashes.

PH testing kits are awful, i only use salifert for that matter. API ive found are all over the place.

Hope This Helps

 

[dw1305]

Hi all

if my ph drops i put powerheads up at the water so in effect they create like waves and turberlance, also remove tank lid and open lots of windows and this will increase the gas exchange!

Another good call, if your CO2 levels have risen, the dissolved carbonic acid will decrease the pH, and extra turbulence will help it out gas to the atmosphere.

Hopefully they've all survived until the weekend when you can get something to increase KH?

cheers Darrel

 

[bre]

Hopefully they've all survived until the weekend when you can get something to increase KH?

cheers Darrel

Surprisingly I have only lost one electric yellow which was still a juvi.

Have got my hands on some KH UP (carbonate hardness generator) so have added some of this to each sump as well as some bicarb. Will do some more tests in the morning and add a bit more.

Thanks guys.

 

[Breamlegend]

I have noticed lower ph in tanks with a lot of snails. I would never have thought of that!