Anyone Tried This Product?

[Queen Bee]

I am having trouble finding the Indian Almond leaves that were recommended for my tank.

I did find a product called Blackwater extract made by Tetra. Anyone used this product? What effects did it have on the tank and the fish. I need to lower ph safely and without chemicals. The blackwater extract sounds like it might be good to use for the fish.

Would appreciate some feedback on things heard or experienced with this product.

 

[drobbyb]

Why are you trying to lower your pH? Most fish can adapt to your tap water's pH. What kind of fish do you have?

I have used the blackwater extract in the past, and I didn't notice any difference other than turning my water tea colored. I quite liked the water being that way, but in the end the price of having to constantly add the extract was too great for my wallet.

 

[Queen Bee]

I have a 45 gallon gourami tank. I used a filter from an old tank to seed the bacteria. The old filter had coral in it and now my ph is at a constant 8. That is way too high for the gourami and want a natural method of lowering it. I am currently looking for some bogwood and peat. The blackwater extract does have some indian almond leaf extract in it as well. I have not been able to find the leaves. I also read about benefits to the fish from using blackwater extract. (healthier, more active, mating more)

Yes, I agree that cost is something to consider. Haven't won lotto yet. But would the cost be acceptable if the fish would be better off with the additive? I've put alot of $ into that tank already and know I will be spending more. Don't want to throw $ away.

I trust people's opinion on this forum more than anyother. That's why I am looking for feedback before I go out and get the product.

 

[drobbyb]

As I stated above, your fish will adapt to a pH of 8.0. For an example, my brother has a pair of german blue rams in his tank with a pH of 8.2. These fish are supposed to be in water that is 6.0-7.0 however they are fine and getting on quite well in the higher pH.

It's best not to adjust your pH if at all possible and gouramis will be fine in that pH.

IMO the cost will outweigh the benefits of adding blackwater extract.

 

[dave_oddballs]

it is always better to adapt your tank to suit your fish than it is to Make your fish adapt to a certain type of water, adding peat (which is a couple of pound in the uk) lowered my ph from about 7.2 to 6.4 to suit my ctenopoma ansorgei, it is perfectly stable, stains the water slightly but its only how it would naturally be. i havent used blackwater extract but as far as i can work out it is basically just a liquid alternative to peat and cattappa leaves.
i do use the leaves in conjunction with the peat, i buy these of ebay, not sure if you will get them as easy in the us, shouldn't be too hard though.
to cut a long answer short, yes blackwater extract may lower your ph and soften the water slightly to suit softwater/blackwater fish,
but from experience i can say the peat works extremely well as do cattappa/indian almond leaves.

imo, advising someone that making fish adapt to water they don't like as opposed to adapting the water to suit the fish is very bad advise!
good luck
Dave

 

[drobbyb]

As you can see, some people will tell you it's ok and others not to mess with it. Fish need stability over anythng else, and I just don't see how that can be possible when you are doing waterchanges and then having to wait for the tank conditions to go back to an altered state.

 

[dave_oddballs]

well you wouldn't have to wait for the water to go back to at altered state would you, the op said their tanks water is at a ph of 8 due to there being coral in the filter, on average, depending which part of the country you are in the water from the tap is around neutral.
it isn't just one person saying one thing and another saying something else, it is common sense that if you are gonna take a fish and put it in your tank the best way is to have your tank set up for the happiness and health of your fish, as opposed to getting some fish and making them live in conditions they are unhappy with.
just because you add something to your water to slightly adjust the ph does not necessarily make it unstable, that would only be the case if you try to dramatically change your water, you can change your ph from e.g. ph8 to ph7 quite safely, using peat is the way i have used to alter the ph and hardness of my water and i do weekly 20% water changes and the ph never changes.
this is using what i see as common sense and my experience.
if the op was to remove the coral from the filter, and carry on with water changes every week, then the probability is their ph would fall from around 8 to about 7 gradually over time so the need to add anything to alter the ph is probably unnecessary.

Dave

 

[Truck]

As you can see, some people will tell you it's ok and others not to mess with it. Fish need stability over anythng else, and I just don't see how that can be possible when you are doing waterchanges and then having to wait for the tank conditions to go back to an altered state.

what about in the wild when it rains...your telling me that a monsoon wont changes the water parameters?

the temperature will drop, the PH will change also due to pollution etc

 

[drobbyb]

Oops I didn't see that the OP had crushed coral in their filter. In this case I agree that removing the coral will gradually bring their pH down.

Truck, that just goes to prove that the fish can adapt to a different pH. They are a whole lot tougher than we give them credit for.

 

[Queen Bee]

Thanks for the feedback. Been reading the replies, and different opinions are good as they give me different aspects to look at and decide what is best for me.

The coral in the tank I am discussing was removed 2 months ago, and still there was no change in the ph. I have 2 other tanks, again they did have coral, I removed it from one of the tanks about 9 months ago (give or take a couple of weeks). The ph in the tank that had coral removed is still at 8. Someone told me that bits of the coral will come apart and escape into the tank. Removing all gravel, washing all decor, and starting over again is not an option. I have 5 tanks and nowhere to store the fish while I redo the tanks and wait for cycling again.

Didn't find the tetra blackwater additive, did find some others today. They list alot of chemicals instead of natural plant extracts. Couldn't find peat or bogwood either. Still looking and researching though.

 

[alchemist]

What is the pH of you tap water?

I am on the side of keeping your water close to your tap water. I think mucking about with your water is going to be troublesome in the long term. I measured the water out of the bag from my LFS to compare against my tank. Their pH was exactly the same as the water from my tap (high Ph). So the fish I am buying have been acclimatised to the local water conditions. If I see a problem with the Ph in my tank - I know that a big water change is going to get me back to where the fish are used to being.

 

[Queen Bee]

What is the pH of you tap water?

I am on the side of keeping your water close to your tap water. I think mucking about with your water is going to be troublesome in the long term. I measured the water out of the bag from my LFS to compare against my tank. Their pH was exactly the same as the water from my tap (high Ph). So the fish I am buying have been acclimatised to the local water conditions. If I see a problem with the Ph in my tank - I know that a big water change is going to get me back to where the fish are used to being.

I have serious issues with the ph dropping in my water. Tap water comes out at 7.6. I found the journal where I tracked the levels everyday. This was done to 2 seprate tanks and both had the same results. After 2 weeks the ph dropped to 6.4, another week later 6 and then the ph was too low to measure on my tests. After a total of 5 weeks having the tanks running without coral, all the fish in one tank up and died one night. The other tank died 2 days later.

I had my water tested at lfs and that's when we found out there were no buffers in our water. He did the test twice as he had never seen this. My boyfriend who lives 2 blocks away and started his tanks same time as me, had all the fish in his tank die the following week.

Lfs has ph of 7. They are in a different city and get their water from a different source. I checked with the water company also. That was when I added the coral. The coral in one tank was in the tank for 2 months before I removed it. It has been out since Nov of last year and still the ph is at 8.

Long story, but that's what I've been dealing with and why I have been looking for natural ways to deal with ph.

 

[saz326]

Im wondering - If you were to use RO water in your tank, would the water would slowly deplete the coral remaining in the tank.... would the coral slowly dissolve as it buffered the RO water?......?

Would take ages if it worked but it may work.

 

[alchemist]

The problem with RO is that you kH (carbonate hardness) is going to be very low - so you will still see wild pH swings.

I think what we need to look at to resolve this problem is to increase the kH and GH - this will naturally increase the pH but if your pH is dropping off - by increasing the kH and GH things should be more stable vs. adding removing coral which is just effecting the pH.
The higher the kH of the water - the pH should not swing back and forth.


I'm lifting this from a google search:

Ways to lower pH

Filtering water over peat
Add bogwood to the tank
Inject carbon dioxide CO2
Use a commercial acid buffer
Water changes with softened water or RO (Reverse Osmosis) water

Ways to raise the pH
Aerate the water, driving off the carbon dioxide (CO2)
Filter over coral or limestone
Add rocks containing limestone to the tank or use a coral sand substrate
Use a commercial alkaline buffer


Ways to increase kH

Adding sodium bicarbonate (baking soda). One teaspoon of baking soda added to 50 liters of water can raise the kH of the water by approx 4 deg dH without a major affect on pH.
Adding an air stone to increase surface turbulence driving off carbon dioxide (CO2)
Adding commercially available products to increase buffering capacity

Ways to lower kH

Injecting carbon dioxide (CO2)
Use reverse osmosis (RO) water. You can mix tap water with reverse osmosis water to achieve the desired kH.
Adding commercially available products to decrease the buffering capacity.

Ways to increase gH

Adding limestone to the aquarium (this will also increase kH which in turn will increase pH)
Adding calcium carbonate will raise gH and kH

Ways to reduce gH

Adding peat moss to your filter
Use commercially available water softening pillows or a water softener
Mixing tap water with reverse osmosis (RO) water.


A long but interesting read is here: GH/kH and pH
This article is from another forum but I think it is very relevant to understand your situation - so hope thats ok with the mods.

 

[drobbyb]

I have the same problem as you where my tap water has no buffering ability. I filter through crushed coral to combat the pH swing. Is it possible that your water authority has a new source? If this could be, maybe the new source has a higher pH and GH KH than the old. I know that my water authority will sometimes in drought buy water from another source, and that source has a higher KH and pH than the main supply.

I don't know if this could be happening in your area, but it is possible.