Not sure how to fix my water issues

Hello! Im new. I want to first thank all the readers and helpers who comment on the other threads. Ive searched for my problem but couldn't find my answer and I need help. The fate of my poor fish depend on it!

Background: I've had an established 10gal for several years and never had a problem. I recently (6 months ago) moved everyone to a 30gal tank and started having problems keeping my ph and nitrate levels maintained. I have already lost 5 fish because of this (I think. Maybe it was a disease)
And now one of my few remaining fish looks like it might pass too.

I've also developed some kind of brushy algae that I cant get off. My algae fish and shrimp wont touch it and Ive taken out the decorations and scrubed my hand and it wont budge.

My ph is terrible, my nitrate is terrible, everything about my water is terrible. (Ive included several pictures)

I only have two tetras and two plecos and one shrimp. Thats it. One of my tetras had faded and always hangs out by the heater (water temp steady at 77)


not sure whats going on. I've been doing daily water changes. Adding ph balancing tablets and drops. How do I get my water at a sustainable level and KEEP IT THAT WAY?

I understand I shouldnt be using those chemicals to try to regulate ph and alkalinity but how else do I do it? I have live plants and do water changes. What else?

What is your tap water PH?

Adding ph balancing tablets

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I would say this is part of the problem, Your fish are better with a stable PH even if its high than the yoyo effect they are suffering now.
Those PH lowering tablets and powders are useless at best and dangerous to your fish, If you must play with PH try using Reverse Osmosis water/ Distilled water and remineralizing it as needed.

my nitrate is terrible

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What water conditioner are you using? Eg Seachem prime.

Heres what I would do.

1 Throw away the PH lowering product.

2 I would do a large water change, about 50%, With just dechlorinated water, then again tomorrow, and the day after that should stabilize the water parameters and your fish wont suffer.

You did cycle the new tank first right?

Hi Hannerbea:

I agree with NickAu that it would be better not to try to change the ph artificially. I suggest that you get a reagent test kit for your principal water parameters (ph, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate) and also a test kit for water hardness (kh/gh), and find the baseline ph, hardness, and nitrate of your tap water as well as the water in your tank. This will help you decide on the most effective next steps.

As NickAu said, it is much better to have a stable ph, even one that is on the high side for your particular species, than to have the ph swinging up and down. Once you have the ph stabilized you can then begin looking into the issues of the nitrate, algae, etc.

Later on, you could look into using distilled or RO water to gradually reduce the hardness (and therefore the ph) to your desired level. For now, though, you should probably focus on getting things stabilized.

One of the more common issues with PH that I have seen is very low PH tap water. This will stress and may kill your fish after a water change. The first thing I would do is to test your tap water. If it reads the lowest value o the color chart it might actually be much lower. For example may PH tests have a minimum reading of 6. the actual value might be 5 or even lower.

If that is your problem the best short term solution is to switch to distilled or RO water. Longer term it might be possible to use an outgas bucket to give the water time to outgas. Once the water has outgases the PH should rise and and then could be safely used in the tank.

StevenF said:

One of the more common issues with PH that I have seen is very low PH tap water. This will stress and may kill your fish after a water change. The first thing I would do is to test your tap water. If it reads the lowest value o the color chart it might actually be much lower. For example may PH tests have a minimum reading of 6. the actual value might be 5 or even lower.

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If your tap water pH was that low, you wouldn't want to drink it.

There does not seem to be a problem with the pH here. The problem may be that the OP is trying to lower it, and this is not going to work, given the GH and KH numbers (and pH) in post #1, assuming the strip test results are fairly accurate.

We first need to know the pH of the tap water, as others have mentioned. We have nothing to compare the tank water tests with until we have the same test results for the tap water alone. Remember to out-gas the CO2 in the tap water before testing (not required with tank water). Let a glass of tap water sit 24 hours before testing.

Assuming the test results are accurate, I would surmise that there is nothing wrong with the pH. But the high GH and KH (relatively) means you are not going to see the pH lower. But the tap water test results will confirm.

Byron.