Think I've Found The Source Of My High Ph

[sneezy]

Thanks TR7. Am taking the kids there for a day out soon so will have a look.

 

[sneezy]

Update on the ph. Left bowls of water from every tap overnight and they are all showing 8.2 as is the tank although that was showing 8.8 last night.

My friend who is a keen (and experienced) aquarium keeper is coming round on Sunday so will pick his brains on how he deals with it.


Also are there any high ph fish that aren't cyclids (sp?) because i really don't want them. I went to tropical purely to have a small community tank

 

[rabbut]

There are chemical's on the market for pH lowering, but they have a tendancy to make the pH bounce, as none lower hardness also...

The safest wat to go is with RO. Stable pH is key, fluctuating pH can kill

Does high PH mean hard water?

Generaly, yes, but not always. With a high pH, before attempting to lower the pH you need to do hardness tests to make sure that you are mixing your water into a resultant water with a stable pH

All the best
Rabbut

 

[sneezy]

will def look into the RO water but I don't think anywhere in our town and Swallow aquatics is about 3/4 hr drive away would be fine if I had a car

No amount of reasoning will get my hubby to change his mind about RO unit lol. Our fishkeeping only started at xmas when my sis got my daughter a goldfish in a bowl. unfortunately where i see cute lil fishies, hubby sees £ signs and he is putting his foot down in a big way (shall I suggest going marine )


Excuse the lack of capitalisation - i'm lazy

 

[rabbut]

(shall I suggest going marine )

You will need an RO unit for that too, but with the cash involved there, I recon it may put the freshwater fish costs into prospective for him

Might be worth mentioning the idea to him, just to see the reaction

I'm being evil now....I'll stop...

All the best
Rabbut

 

[dusky]

Trouble is once you start messing about with the PH its hard to maintain a stable balance. I believe that if you put lots of plants in the roots will suck up alot of it or whatever they do?

 

[rabbut]

Ay, messing with pH and keeping it stable is hard, thats why I say go with RO, after giving hardness values. The lowest you can safely push doen the KH is to 3dkh. Any lower and the pH may crash. pH chemicals lower the pH and not the hardness. Because pH is reliant on hardness, if you push down the pH withough moving hardness, the pH will simply move back to where it was within a few hours

All the best
Rabbut

 

[tangokitty]

I would do RO water, everything else is so unstable. Try sweet talking the hubby!

 

[sneezy]

Oh i have no intention of using chemicals. Will look into things. i have plenty of time seeing as my tank is no longer cycled

 

[cuprajake]

its a shame you dont like cichlids lol your water is perfect for them, alot of people would kill for that water out of their taps lol.

as others have said ro really is the only other option, but its costly. you could get water from the lfs but that will cost too, dont you have a good friend who lives a bit away, could test their water lol.

plants and bog wood could help, but to do it effectivley you'd need a co2 system,

it might be better to get fish suited to your water than to mess with your water, have a ph spike and kill some fish you really want to keep.

i was a tropical planted tank owner, loved the fish you could get, but moved over to a malawi tank and never looked back, there so vibrant active little fish. have a quick look on lakemalawi .co.uk

 

[sneezy]

cuprajake, i only have a 60l tank so there are very few cichlids I could house. Plus my young children are going to show more interest in lots of colourful fish.


My ph has remained stable at 8.2 for a few days now. my friend down the road has just filled a new tank which is also at 8.2, but her other smaller one which is fully cycled and has had fish for about 8 weeks has a ph of 7.6 so we are wondering if the ph naturally drops over time?? She has only recently got a testing kit so we don't know her original ph but can assume it was also 8.2 (tap water)


Also am slightly confused because my tank has had a normal ph at times. Would it be of any use to take out one rock/ornament at a time and keep it overnight in a bowl of tank water and note ph changes in the morning. Then I would be able to see if there was any specific object affecting ph levels (even though I have done the vinegar test on all)

 

[rabbut]

It will be the tap water source that is caursing the pH raise. pH will drop with time, but not by a great deal, 7.6 would be about the lowest I'd expect it to drop in your tank

CO2 will lower the pH by UPTO .5, so IMO isn't realy worth it here since you need a larger drop than this...

All the best
Rabbut