Tank Chemistry

[Stuart.Wiltshire]

I need some help with understanding what a raised PH does to the how a raised PH acts with other water perameters.

The story so far.

My Stats today are PH 8.6/8.7, AMM 0.25ppm, nitrite 0.05ppm, nitrate 2.5ppm, ALK 1.7-2.8mil/L, SG 1.025, temp 25.5C.

My stock is 4"blue spotted tang, 4"yellow tang, 2x 2"green chromis, 3"cleaner wrasse, 4" Maroon clown, 2" mandarin, 6" sea hare, 5x cleaner shrimp, 1x fire shrimp, 2x 5"star fish, 40+ various snails, 8 x hermits.

leather musroom, various other small soft coral. All livestock are eating and appear happy and well.

Tank and sump equate to 95 gallon, including 60+ kg of live rock. tank has been cycled more than 5 months. never seen ammonia since cycling.

I returned to my LFS today a with beaten up Bubble Tip Anenome, this is after only one week, the clown was so excited and has continualyy harrased this poor creature to submission and the blue spotted tang, i suspect, started to bite chunks out of it. The LFS is doing every thing he can to try to save hime but we suspect he is the cause of the ammonia and nitrite traces.

I carried out a 25% water change today, more tomorrow.

I am troubled by the high PH, even my fresh, 1 week aged water is giving a pH of 8.6.

The question is should i use buffer to bring it down to range, or is this acceptable, my LFS says that i should only do water changes and not use buffer. Since the shop closed before i tested the fresh water he isnt aware of my findings.

Best advice please.

 

[kkyyllee]

pooor fish it doesnt sounds like u researched any befoer throwing them in there, ur parameters are horrible, i really doubt that is has been setup five months with those fish, unless u just added all of them, the mandarin will starve or is starving

whats the display tank volume?

 

[SkiFletch]

PH 8.6/8.7 ... ALK 1.7-2.8mil/L

How?

That's a really low alk and a really high pH. Are you sure you're doing the tests correctly? Have you had another person (LFS/friend) verify your testing? TBH, I wasn't aware that saltwater could have those properties, something else (maybe magnesium) must be out of whack. Usually high alkalinity equals high pH, but in your case you have low alk and high pH... Very contradictory. The good news is that the fish could care less, so now in the absence of the nem, I'd just leave it be.

what kind of salt are you using? and what's your calcium?

 

[Stuart.Wiltshire]

My calcium is 420ppm, the salt i use is aquamedic and i use a RO+DI system, directly off my mains water, i use a in line phosphate reactor with rawaphos and a UV steriliser i have always been plagued with algae, hence the sea hare, could this also be high magnesium levels?

When i checked ALK there are three colours matching the range, my test tube showed a perfect green, that matched with the stats i mentioned earlier. You can probably tell i am always seeking advice at my local LFS, i do get frustrated at the countless contradictions. specifaclly feeding, about 2 months ago, my yellow tang would not feed, i was told to try marine flake, artemia, nory, nothing worked, he would frenzy with the rest of them at the feed, but never eat. I introduced a fire shrimp and wrasse, with 30 minutes he was being groomed by both parties and started eating every thing and anything i presented him. I was later told by a different person in the LFS not to use flake, uneaten flake causes many more additianal problems, probably the root cause of a high population of copopods.

I had no intention of adding a nem, until a visit to my LFS with problem with the clown. The maroon clown had furry barbs that he would rub against the rock making one of his cheeks swell. the LFS chastised me and told me that all clowns must be matched with a Nem and that the furr was probably mucas that the nem would solve. I had been contradictory advice from the guy who sold me the clown, "maroon clowns dont need a nem, they are happy without" and because my tank was not yet 6 months established i took the earlier advice and to be honest he seemed very happy with the other fish i had mentioned. Anyhow, i checked stats, i used a red sea marine testing lab, all stats showed acceptable apart from PH, the upper range on the test kit is 8.6. i did the test twice, and studying the colours against the white background i had convinced myself it PH looked to be OK.

When i took the nem back to the LFS yesterday, i asked him to test my water, i beleived that the water was OK and that the problem was with the bullying. It was the LFS that told me there was Nitrites present and high PH. he suspected the the nitrite was down to the sick nem.

Obviously concerned I went home and checked every stat, bar the calcium, i did that last week, the LFS would not sell nem without that stat being checked and within accepetable limits.

I had purchased a calcium reactor, CO kit and PH contoller (dennerle), i hadnt got around to setting it up yet. I took the PH contoller and probe, callorbrated it with the solutions i have (PH 4.01, PH7), and checked my water. i found levels of PH 8.67-8.7. this was after i had visited the LFS with my stats, potentially looking for PH buffer to bring it within range.

Whilst i was doing the water change i checked the PH of the new water. 8.6? This is what prompted me to seek guidence. i have read somewhere that a high PH will exagerate some of the other water perameters.

Incidently, the manderin introduced 3 weeks ago, was bought to feed on the high population of copopods, on the advice of my LFS, again i walked in with a problem and walked out with a fish and £20 lighter. the dispaly tank is 1200x450x600 high.

 

[SkiFletch]

Oh jeez, you're using a pH probe and expecting it to be accurate? Sorry, but I don't trust those things as far as I can spit. Have you verified your pH with a liquid test kit? It sounds like you have balanced calc and alk which SHOULD lead to a pH of ~8.2. So either your magnesium is atrociously high, or WAY more likely, your pH probe is flaky

 

[Lynden]

pooor fish it doesnt sounds like u researched any befoer throwing them in there, ur parameters are horrible, i really doubt that is has been setup five months with those fish, unless u just added all of them, the mandarin will starve or is starving

whats the display tank volume?

This is irrelevant to the problem... if you can't help, don't post.



Stuart, f you're fish seem to be doing well, my advice would be to continue on as normal; doing water changes, testing, feeding (perhaps a little less)... Marine fish can do well in a fairly wide pH range, and though 8.6 is fairly high, it is still within acceptable limits. Assuming that IS what the pH is.

In addition, anemones can be tricky at the best of times; some tanks which can house Acropora and others perfectly well still cannot house an anemone.

 

[Stuart.Wiltshire]

Thanks guys for your positive response as a newbie i appreciate your comments.

Ski, Probe would seem to confirm previous liquid tests, liquid tester goes up to 8.6 and my samples were certainly showing the higher end of the scale. I will buy test and check magnesium, my lfs is very local to me, he would have the same water supply and thus the same problem with mag if its present, is it worth asking him?

Lyden, the BTA was bullyed by the clown, if i put my hand in the tank it would flick its tail very hard at the nem as if it were his fault i was there. When the nem climbed between rocks, it looked like other fish had taken chunks out of the back of it. Obvously i only noticed this when i retrieved it on Saturday.

Anyhow the lfs has it now and assures my daugther it will get better, im not so sure!

 

[Lynden]

Whoa. Is the maroon still rubbing his cheeks on the rock?

 

[Stuart.Wiltshire]

Yes, Since nem has gone, clown has gone back to its old ways, rubbed both barbs off, i assume on the rocks, both cheeks have fuzzy mucas around where the barbs were and one of his cheeks is quite swollen.

He is feeding well and continues to defend his patch where the nem was, but on the whole is less aggressive.

 

[Lynden]

In case of fungus, 'Melafix' works miracles and is totally reef safe. I'm convinced it saved my Eibl's Angel's life (who, months later, died of an ich outbreak).