Hard Water

[Ford]

Apperantly I have very hard water.
What causes this?
What effect does it have on the fish?
And how do I remedy this?
TIA,
-James/Kristyne

 

[Alien Anna]

To try to answer your questions:

1. How hard is your water exactly? I need the KH and GH values. I doubt it's harder than mine - mine's like liquid granite!

2. It is caused by ground water seeping through limestone on it's journey from the resevoir to your house. Hardness is basically chalk - its the stuff that furs up your kettle (down side) and gives you strong teeth (good side).

3. The effects on most fish are minimal but it strongly depends on the type of fish: if you have West African cichlids or mollies, they'll love you for it; If you have tetras or danios, they'll probably cope fine one acclimatised; if you have discus, they probably won't live very long in it. Most common beginner fish will be absolutely fine.

4. You don't necessarily need to remedy it and depending on the type of fish you get, you might not want to. But if you have tetras, danios, rasboras etc. you could soften the water somewhat by having bogwood and plants in your aquarium. Once you were more experienced you could consider using RO water (similar to distilled water) or peat-filtered water but as a beginner I wouldn't suggest you go there.

Call me a cynic if you like, but 90% of the time Local Fish Shops tell newbies stuff like this to panic them into buying expensive chemicals that do nothing more than complicate things horrendously and kill off fish.

Don't worry about hardness at this stage - worry about getting your tank properly cycled so your fish don't die on you the first week you get them.

 

[mrV]

What causes this?

Hardness of water means how much there is earth-alkaline metal ions, usually Ca2+ ja Mg2+, in water (sometimes Ba, Sr, Fe, Cu, Al, Zn... too).

What effect does it have on the fish?

It affects fishs physiology, "osmothic pressure" <- Get some books of biology and fish. If the osmothic pressure is wrong for fishes, it causes lot of stress to fishes. And when they are under stress they become sick usually. So, if you know your tap-water is hard, it is recommended to buy fishes which live in hard water area in nature. So, don't put any soft water fish into hard water tank and other way neither.

And how do I remedy this?

E.g. using ioni-exchanger / RO-units or beeing not to buy soft water fishes.

And like A-Anna said, if your KH is high, you try to use peat-filtration - it effects carbonate hardness.

 

[Ford]

Well since Mollies are my prime fish then I guess I have nothing to worry about. I don't know the specks cuz my girl friend did the reading and in the note she left for it only said "Very hard water". I'll talk to her in the morning and post just how hard the water really is.
-James/Kristyne

 

[repunzlie]

I went to petsmart today to get my water tested.
They didnt tell me how hard my water was.. but they said I need to buy some conditioning salt (Top Fin).

Since have
2mollies
2 guppies
2 dwarf frogs

Should I not have to worry about using the "salt"?