ph question

[gaya]

Hi all,

I am confused about my ph in the different tanks I have. In my planted 29g the ph is always around 7.2 and in my planted 10g the ph is always around 6.8. They both get water from the same source so why are the ph's different. Is it the size?

thanks
gina

 

[yhbae]

Hi all,

I am confused about my ph in the different tanks I have. In my planted 29g the ph is always around 7.2 and in my planted 10g the ph is always around 6.8. They both get water from the same source so why are the ph's different. Is it the size?

thanks
gina

Are you injecting any CO2 into your 10g? If not, then probably something in your tank is leeching out acidic substance... Do you have any drift wood in that tank?

 

[Da_Oz]

Could be th amount of the bioload in the tanks.

 

[gaya]

one thing that is different between the two tanks is one plant that I could not identify. I got it at my LFS and they did not know what it was. It actually kind of looks like parsley. It hasn't been doing that well either.
I just removed it. I hope that's the problem.

 

[yhbae]

I doubt a live plant would cause that much swing in pH. Usually, it is either some chemicals leeching or higher level of CO2. I've seen not-so-well maintained tanks also tend to drop in pH as well but this happens over time, slowly...

 

[gaya]

I just don't know. I set up both tanks at the same time. the 10g was for quarantine. same water source, same maintenance, same everything.

 

[gaya]

yah!!! I just took a ph reading and now it's at 7. What a jump. I hope that doesn't mess with my neons. yesterday i pulled out every plant that i was not able to absolutely identify so now it's a very lightly planted tank. I've read somewhere on the web that terrestrial plants can reak havoc on a tank and some of the plants that got at my LFS do look like reg plants. I have one plant in my 29g that is questionable. I wonder if I should pull that as well just to be on the safe side.