Ph

My ph is getting higher... it comes out of the faucet around 6 and now it's up to 8 or better, in both of my tanks

I had a piece wood soaking, I boiled it and put it in my tank today.

I had used some garland from hobby lobby, got some of it in some water to see what happens

There are two main causes for pH change in aquaria.
 
The first is that water companies sometimes temporarily alter the ph, to prevent corrosion in the pipes. You should stand your tap water for 24 hours before testing it, so that that can wear off.
 
The other main cause is something in the tank, usually the substrate/gravel or ornaments that are dissolving and pushing the pH (and, almost certainly the hardness too) up. You can test that by putting a handful of gravel in a jar, alongside a jar of plain tap water, and testing them both after a couple of days and see if they differ.
 
It looks like you might have seashells in your tank? If so, they're probably what's causing your issues.

There rocks, just put them in today, mostly just to hold the wood downthis looks high to me, but I'm not sure I'm seeing good enough..


The gravel in the 55 is from walmart, have always used it. The gravel in the ten is the painted stuff that was in there when we bought it at a yard sale.

The water in my topping off bucket that had set for a day and a half didn't change much or if any.

I did get some garland from hobby lobby, got some of it in water now

Gonna see if I can get my water tested at the pet store, the last place I lived had well water so soft it felt slimy. We're on city water here, I know it's harder than before.

Petco said the pH was fine, my natrates and natrates were high.

They sent the wife home with some water conditioner, and said to change the water and wash the gravel ...

Toney said:

Petco said the pH was fine, my natrates and natrates were high.

They sent the wife home with some water conditioner, and said to change the water and wash the gravel ...

Click to expand...

 
I was in your position a few months ago.
 
The masters here taught me so much I want to try to pass it on.
 
You should purchase an API Freshwater Master Test Kit and do the test yourself. Knowing the Nitrites and Nitrates are "high" doesn't help us (esp. the experts around here!) help you too much.
 
You should also look up your municipality's water report for 2015 or whatever year you can get (2016 will likely not yet be available) and see what the General Hardness (GH) and Alkalinity (not the same alkalinity as pH measures, but rather they call it "KH" a lot). These will generally be measured in either ppm or gpg.
 
The pH looks like 8.0-8.2 to me, does seem very alkaline, but isn't necessarily a big problem. Oddly enough I have the exact reverse situation, where the pH of the water that comes out of the faucet is about 8.0, by the time it's in the tank for a day or two, it's down to 6.2-6.4.
 
I was told that driftwood, when properly prepared and meant for an Aquatic environment, will leech tannins into the water but that will have a negligible effect on the water pH. A bigger effect will be seen from the decomposition of water decor that isn't particularly suited to the tank (perhaps the garland?) Sea shells will make your water much more alkaline (what I've been doing to make mine more alkaline since last week...) as Fluttermouth suggested.
 
But please, snap up a test kit from Amazon or wherever, and do the drip tests!

 
There are two main causes for pH change in Aquarian.
 
The first is that water companies sometimes temporarily alter the ph, to prevent corrosion in the pipes. You should stand your tap water for 24 hours before testing it, so that that can wear off.
 
The other main cause is something in the tank, usually the substrate/gravel or ornaments that are dissolving and pushing the pH (and, almost certainly the hardness too) up. You can test that by putting a handful of gravel in a jar, alongside a jar of plain tap water, and testing them both after a couple of days and see if they differ.
 
It looks like you might have seashells in your tank? If so, they're probably what's causing your issues.

Click to expand...

There are many possible causes of a high PH.  It can be caused by:
1)something leaching minerals into the tank.
2) nutrient imbalance.
3)fertilizers
4)too much water conditioner.
5) insufficient water cycling in combination with any of the above.
 
For starters you should be doing a 50% water change once per week.  However since you have a high PH I would do the water changes more frequently until the PH comes down to about 7.
 
See Shells or coral will not push your PH this high.  They have a very limited effect on PH and very limited water solubility.  See shells in pure water will push the GH to about 25, KH to 50 and PH to about 7.  They will not go much beyond that unless your water is very acidic (PH of 5 or less) out of the tap.  Wood typically makes water more acidic.  While not impossible it can make it basic (PH over 7).  So I don't believe that is it, but I can not eliminate it as a possibility.
 
Rocks and gravel can push the PH up.  The best thing to do with rocks is to remove them and the put them in a bucket of water with a known GH, KH, and PH value.  Wait a couple of days the then retest the water.  If the GH, KH, and PH change significantly I would not put it back in the aquarium.  You could test everything in your aquarium this way.  Ornaments, substrate, wood, and rocks.  For the substrate I would only test a sample of it.  I wouldn't do all of it unless you have eliminated all other possibilities.  
 
The size of your PH change is quite large.  This suggests to me that a strong base is in your water.  Sodium and Potassium are strong bases and can easily push the PH over 8.  Potassium is in all fertilizers and potassium and sodium are used in may water conditioners as a chlorine removing agent.  When plants grow they may use up some of the minerals in the water and then reject what they don't need.  For example if you fertilize with potassium nitrate fertilizer the plants may absorb the nitrate and the reject the potassium causing PH to increase.  Ammonia is also a base and it will push the ph higher but all your fish would be dead if you had enough ammonia to have a PH effect this large.  
 
I would get a GH and KH test kit as well as a ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate test kit.  Also look for your water utility water quality report (which is probably available online.  And if possible post a link to it.  There might be something in there that might be important.  Then I would also start testing rocks and other things from the aquarium.  Also keep up the water changes until the PH is back around 7.  If you don't do anything your PH my increase further and harm your fish.

Note all the GH and KH numbers in my earlier post are in parts per million.