What water tests do I need to do regularly?

[saxxy]

Could someone tell me what water tests I need to do, and how regularly. Plus which brand would you recommend and are there any UK sites on the internet that sell them quite cheaply where I can mail order them from?

Your help will be much appreciated thanks B)

 

[focus]

i got mine from my lfs wasn't a bad price i got a 5 in 1 tester
dip a stick a see the colours change and i bet at the start your test your water a lot more then needed i went thought 30 sticks in one week

 

[Ron]

I do Ammonia and Nitrite tests. I don't bother with Ph, cuz I can't change it anyways.
Ron

 

[saxxy]

I found a tetra one that tests PH, Carbonate Hardness, General Hardness, Nitrite and CO2. I'd have to buy a separate Ammonia one. Does this sound ok?

 

[saxxy]

Oh yeah, and what is IFS? Sorry I'm thick

 

[Alien Anna]

I regularly test for nitrite (because that can kill fish and can happen in your tank at any time), nitrate (because I have sensitive fish and tap water that's like liquid fertiliser) and pH (because I regularly peat-filter and have just started CO2, both of which lower pH). I keep an ammonia test on hand but I'd be very surprised to find ammonia in any of my tanks.

I also need to test KH and GH, but only because I have CO2.

I prefer the Tetra testing kits, but also use Hagen (because their pH test kit is better value if you use it a lot).

 

[focus]

Oh yeah, and what is IFS? Sorry I'm thick

http/fish.orbust.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=6042
your find all the help here

 

[AquaNut]

I really think it all depends on the way in which you wish to go about keeping fish. There is no need to turn into the nutty professor, if you do not wish. I have a pH test kit. I occasionally use it if I'm moving fish from one tank to another, to make sure the pH difference isn't too high. However, I pretty much already know what the pH is in each of my tanks, and because they're stable, it rarely fluctuates. I have a nitrate test kit around somewhere that I bought to settle an argument over whether or not the way in which I maintain my tanks would lead to excessive nitrates in the water (it does not). I have never owned an ammonia test, a nitrite test, or any sort of hardness tests. If there were ever to be nitrites in my water, my fish would let me know pretty quickly. I don't just watch my fish, I observe them. At the first sign of even minimal distress or failure to thrive, I do a partial water change and have a look at my filter media to see if it needs rinsing. I understand how the water chemistry affects the fish and why, but I'm just not terribly interested in it. It doesn't particularly matter to me if the reason my fish seem less than thrilled is a sudden bit of nitrite in the water or something else entirely. I do a partial water change and everyone's happy again. I'm not discouraging you from testing your water, I just thought I'd share a slightly different perspective.

 

[saxxy]

Thanx Aquanut
Is it ph that affects fish the most then?

 

[Ron]

LFS= Local Fish Shop or Local Fish Store.
Ron

 

[focus]

yeah its funny you can buy all the test under the sun and it still gose wrong sometimes
and on the hardness test don't bother i was told that unless your taken a fish from the wild the fish from your lfs store should be the same as yours (nearly)and the fish are used to it ( don't shout at me if thats wrong i was told it )
i just cheack ph,nitrite and nitrate but even i test every 2-3 days can't stop my tank from just doing a mini cycle

 

[AquaNut]

Thanx Aquanut
Is it ph that affects fish the most then?

No no... pH is not what effects fish the most, although a large sudden fluctuation in pH can cause pH shock. Ammonia is totally lethal to fish, even in minute amounts. However, because my tanks are well established, I need not worry about ammonia.

Once my tanks stabilize, I don't play with the water chemistry. I don't try and change the pH or hardness, and I don't use any sort of medications that may alter the bacterial balance. One of my tanks runs consistently soft and acidic, another runs consistently basic, and the others are always spot on 7.0. I treat them all the same, and all are planted with live plants and decorated with assorted rocks and wood. I suppose I could figure out why they run differently, but I don't really care. I also suppose I could try and alter the pH, but certainly have no desire to do that. Like I said, it's just another way of doing things.

 

[Alien Anna]

I just wanted to agree with something AquaNut said about not bothering to do tests if you have stable, mature tanks and you don't fiddle around with pH or KH or whatever. There is no substitute for observation and knowing your own fish really well.

This is yet another reason for progressing slowly when you start out in this hobby, and not try to get too many species at once. You can't get experience out of books or from chemistry sets.

The reason I do tests quite a lot is
1. Because I like biochemistry (I actually studied for a degree in at university) and I like to know what's going on.
2. Because I keep doing fancy things with my water, such as CO2 injection and trying to suit my water to delicate species of fish (this is a good way to kill fish, btw, and not to be recommended).

However, even I've chucked out water testing kits because they've gone out of date - I go through phases, such as when I'm doing fishless cycling on a new tank.

Next week I'm getting fish mail-order from a soft, acid water area of the country (our water's like liquid granite and high pH). So I'll be testing pH to get the fish into water that is half-way to the main tank's pH. I could probably do this without actually testing the pH but I'm very obsessive like that - I have to know the numbers.

OTOH, when you're a newbie with your first tank, or a more experienced aquarist venturing into more difficult fish (such as marine fish), you also need to know the numbers because you can't get instant experience and instantly know your fish. If you notice, when newbies join and say "My fish are dying but I don't know why" we all harrass them to tell us their ammonia, nitrite and pH. That's because unlike many experienced fish-keepers, newbies can't just look their platie in the eye and say "Oh, a bit of a nitrite spike in the tank and I think possibly my pH has just crashed due to a rather low KH..."