D
Deleted member 155206
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Ordered 350 Juwel trigon am attempting to do the blackwater just wandering has anybody has experience with this and any advice u can give me 
TwoTankAmin
Fish Maniac
When you say blackwater are you meaning you want stained water or do you mean you are also wanting the water to be soft with an acid (below 7.0) pH?
I ran ran Altum angel tank for many years. I lower the PH softened the water and stained heck out of it. What this took was a mix of RO water and tap, alder cones, catappa leaves and sometimes muritatic acid. I also used Rooibos tea for staining but it did not do much to change the parameters. If all you want to do is the staining and not the parameter lowering, then I would suggest the Rooibos.
I bought a few kilos of it.
Will stain water like peat, almond leaves or alder cones and can be used with them.
Will not soften water or lower pH. It is more likely to bump pH up by 0.1.
Can be brewed like tea and poured into the water or can be put into a bag in one’s filter. Once brewed it can be stored refrigerated for about a week.
When brewing, allow it to boil for a bit after the tea is added to the hot water.
It is hard to overdose. Start with 1 tablespoon per 10 gal. (38 L) of water and adjust from there to find the color you like.
Wikipedia (at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooibos) states:
“Rooibos is becoming more popular in Western countries, particularly among health-conscious consumers, due to its high level of antioxidants such as aspalathin and nothofagin, its lack of caffeine, and its low tannin levels compared to fully oxidized black tea or unoxidized green tea leaves. Rooibos also contains a number of phenolic compounds, including flavanols, flavones, flavanones, and dihydrochalcones”.
In fish keeping we are interested in the plant phenolic compounds that act as antioxidants and antibacterials (it won’t harm filters). This is similar to the humic acids found in natural tea stained water. Oak leaves contain the plant phenolic quercetin (from the Latin name for oak trees, Quercus robur). Rooibos contains some quercetin plus the compound aspalathin, closely related to quercetin.
Research at the University of Stellenbosch indicates that rooibos has natural stress relieving properties. It is safe to use and is beneficial for both keepers and fish. The "organic" label is unnecessary as rooibos is grown naturally without insecticides and herbicides, they are just simply not needed and can actually harm the plant. Here is an email I got from an Altum keeper:
“Hey Chris, just wanted to let you know that my big bag (almost gone, I guess we are using it more than my altum!) Last night I wrapped some (rooibos) with sphagnum peat moss in a fine mesh bag that my wife made for the purpose and I simply put it in one of the overflow boxes. You gotta see how nice the water and the fish look today.”
If you are changing parameters you will need some digital testing equipment. You cannot use color based tests on stained water.
I ran ran Altum angel tank for many years. I lower the PH softened the water and stained heck out of it. What this took was a mix of RO water and tap, alder cones, catappa leaves and sometimes muritatic acid. I also used Rooibos tea for staining but it did not do much to change the parameters. If all you want to do is the staining and not the parameter lowering, then I would suggest the Rooibos.
I bought a few kilos of it.
Rooibos Tea
Is beneficial for fish, 100% caffeine and tannin free and you can drink it too.Will stain water like peat, almond leaves or alder cones and can be used with them.
Will not soften water or lower pH. It is more likely to bump pH up by 0.1.
Can be brewed like tea and poured into the water or can be put into a bag in one’s filter. Once brewed it can be stored refrigerated for about a week.
When brewing, allow it to boil for a bit after the tea is added to the hot water.
It is hard to overdose. Start with 1 tablespoon per 10 gal. (38 L) of water and adjust from there to find the color you like.
- Buying Rooibos helps to support the local farmers in South Africa.
Wikipedia (at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooibos) states:
“Rooibos is becoming more popular in Western countries, particularly among health-conscious consumers, due to its high level of antioxidants such as aspalathin and nothofagin, its lack of caffeine, and its low tannin levels compared to fully oxidized black tea or unoxidized green tea leaves. Rooibos also contains a number of phenolic compounds, including flavanols, flavones, flavanones, and dihydrochalcones”.
In fish keeping we are interested in the plant phenolic compounds that act as antioxidants and antibacterials (it won’t harm filters). This is similar to the humic acids found in natural tea stained water. Oak leaves contain the plant phenolic quercetin (from the Latin name for oak trees, Quercus robur). Rooibos contains some quercetin plus the compound aspalathin, closely related to quercetin.
Research at the University of Stellenbosch indicates that rooibos has natural stress relieving properties. It is safe to use and is beneficial for both keepers and fish. The "organic" label is unnecessary as rooibos is grown naturally without insecticides and herbicides, they are just simply not needed and can actually harm the plant. Here is an email I got from an Altum keeper:
“Hey Chris, just wanted to let you know that my big bag (almost gone, I guess we are using it more than my altum!) Last night I wrapped some (rooibos) with sphagnum peat moss in a fine mesh bag that my wife made for the purpose and I simply put it in one of the overflow boxes. You gotta see how nice the water and the fish look today.”
If you are changing parameters you will need some digital testing equipment. You cannot use color based tests on stained water.
Last edited:
First, measure or research the hardness of your water. I run a number of blackwater tanks, but I start with very soft tapwater. Do you have that, or will you need reverse osmosis?
OP
OP
Deleted member 155206
Guest
Hi there thx for reply yes that’s exactly what I want to do. out of the tap my ph is 6.0 to 6.5 angels corys cardinal tetras these are the type of fish I want to keep with your experience would you say in real world terms does it really benefit them like longer life span behave differently in a good way less stressful and do the colour really pops out through the stained water. All be putting like dead leave branches spider would and some stem plants and cones just to create that natural look which am hoping the might love it cause am thinking if they are farm bred they might not like it at all
OP
OP
Deleted member 155206
Guest
Hi there thx for reply yes my water is good between 10 - 20 out of tap in ur experience do the fish really benefit from cause am going all in to recreate the waters my biggest fear is where am from there farm breed and they might not like it
OP
OP
Deleted member 155206
Guest
Hi there thx for reply yes my water does match this thx
Do they benefit... yes and no. The fish and the fishkeeper....
It's more work for you. When I moved to my current house, I had softer water than I'd ever dealt with before. I learned quickly that it wasn't well buffered, and that I had to be rigorous with my water changes. I do 30% every week to 10 days. I don't skip.
I use oak leaves, and rooibos. I don't care about pH and find it secondary. I've bred wild caught Apistogramma from a pH in the area of 5 at pH 6.8. What matters is the mineral content - the hardness. Yours sounds good.
Here's my advice. Stick with the tapwater, as it appears good and won't bounce with every water change. Stability is crucial. Use rooibos tea for its cosmetic effect. I get inexpensive tea bags, and they do the job well. I keep and breed a lot of wild caught tetras and dwarf Cichlids.
Rooibos gives a nice warm reddish tinge. I have used decaf black tea, and got a heavy look from it. Alder cone tea can work. Oak leaves do well, but can become homes for a softwater parasite, Oodinium spp, if left to decay. If the parasite gets in, it'll live in the litter and move to the fish if anything goes wrong. It's the same with all leaf litter, and with overfeeding commercial foods. Right now, it doesn't seem present in my tanks, but that's because I had to kill it at one point, as it was killing fish.
If you use an online stocking calculator, take what it says and cut. I suggest you stock at 50% what they suggest. They only look at the tank chemically, at the nitrogen cycle and don't see the tank as living creatures that need room.
I think the colours of my fish in the kind of dark water they evolved in look great. A lot of people hate it and think my tanks can be dark and dingy.
Blackwater tanks also take research and reading. Just because a fish is found in a wide region where there is blackwater doesn't mean that's their habitat. I could take you to creeks around my Canadian home that have classic blackwater, but also ones nearby that have clear water. The fish in each are different, and you couldn't generalize. There are blackwater corys and clearwater ones - just as there are corys with radically different temperature needs. The idea is to adapt your tanks to the fish - not to make them adapt to your vision. So the reading/researching legwork is needed.
It's a little more work, and a purist would say I didn't have true blackwater tanks. They'd be right to a point as I start with softwater and then get tannins into it - 'black' coloured water tanks. I can breed cardinals in them with limited success, so I'm not far off. I aim for stability and clean water, and figure blackwater is a vague word, and if you show me 5 blackwater water bodies in 5 regions they may well be subtly different anyway. You'll be approximating.
My city draws its water from blackwater lakes and filters out the tannins. I put a version of them back.
It's more work for you. When I moved to my current house, I had softer water than I'd ever dealt with before. I learned quickly that it wasn't well buffered, and that I had to be rigorous with my water changes. I do 30% every week to 10 days. I don't skip.
I use oak leaves, and rooibos. I don't care about pH and find it secondary. I've bred wild caught Apistogramma from a pH in the area of 5 at pH 6.8. What matters is the mineral content - the hardness. Yours sounds good.
Here's my advice. Stick with the tapwater, as it appears good and won't bounce with every water change. Stability is crucial. Use rooibos tea for its cosmetic effect. I get inexpensive tea bags, and they do the job well. I keep and breed a lot of wild caught tetras and dwarf Cichlids.
Rooibos gives a nice warm reddish tinge. I have used decaf black tea, and got a heavy look from it. Alder cone tea can work. Oak leaves do well, but can become homes for a softwater parasite, Oodinium spp, if left to decay. If the parasite gets in, it'll live in the litter and move to the fish if anything goes wrong. It's the same with all leaf litter, and with overfeeding commercial foods. Right now, it doesn't seem present in my tanks, but that's because I had to kill it at one point, as it was killing fish.
If you use an online stocking calculator, take what it says and cut. I suggest you stock at 50% what they suggest. They only look at the tank chemically, at the nitrogen cycle and don't see the tank as living creatures that need room.
I think the colours of my fish in the kind of dark water they evolved in look great. A lot of people hate it and think my tanks can be dark and dingy.
Blackwater tanks also take research and reading. Just because a fish is found in a wide region where there is blackwater doesn't mean that's their habitat. I could take you to creeks around my Canadian home that have classic blackwater, but also ones nearby that have clear water. The fish in each are different, and you couldn't generalize. There are blackwater corys and clearwater ones - just as there are corys with radically different temperature needs. The idea is to adapt your tanks to the fish - not to make them adapt to your vision. So the reading/researching legwork is needed.
It's a little more work, and a purist would say I didn't have true blackwater tanks. They'd be right to a point as I start with softwater and then get tannins into it - 'black' coloured water tanks. I can breed cardinals in them with limited success, so I'm not far off. I aim for stability and clean water, and figure blackwater is a vague word, and if you show me 5 blackwater water bodies in 5 regions they may well be subtly different anyway. You'll be approximating.
My city draws its water from blackwater lakes and filters out the tannins. I put a version of them back.
Gertrudae
Fish Fanatic
Word!
TwoTankAmin
Fish Maniac
People and this junk about the stability of parameters. They talk about matching conditions to suit the fish. Well, I worked with a lot of fish which live in seasonal waters. That means a dry and a rainy season. I bred a lot of Hypancistrus from the Big bend of the Rio Xingu. What triggers them to breed is unstable conditions. There are distinct rainy and dry seasons and the changeover from the peak of the dry season when the onset of the rain comes the parameters change a lot.
With zebra plecos spawning does not rely on specific TDS/conductivity it happens when the parameters change, Because I was in contact with a number of zebra breeders as well as people like Hans Geor Evers, Ingo Seidel and in recent years Leandro Sousa, I have a pretty decent knowledge an experience breeding them.
The exact TDS/conductivity is not so important was is important is how much they change in response to the onset of the rainy season. What I tell people who are having trouble getting then to spawn is to run a dry.rainy simulation over several months. What ever the tds/conductivity is at the peak of the dry, I instruct them that when the time comes to do the onset of the rainy they need to drop the TD.conductivity by 50% in a matter of 36 to 48 hours.
My tap runs about 83 ppm TDS and 7.0 ph. I would use that for the rainy season. To simulate the dry I would over about 3 months raise my number so that te TDS were about 175 ppm and the pH would be allowed to drift upward s towards 7.5. My normal temp for then is in the mid 80s, anywhere from about 83F to 86F, I would be raising that parameter as well so that at the peak of the dry it was about 92F. When the time came for the rainy I waited for a storm to roll in and then did the following.
I woud do a huge water change of 50+%. First. I turned down the heater from the 92 to 78 and then unplugged it, The new water going in had the following paramters: temp. 75F, TDS 83 ppm and pH 7.0. Shortly after the water change I plugged in the heater. Then after 24 -36 hours I prepeated the water change but this time the heater was reset to the low 80s- 80-82.
I will bet you dollars to donuts that most folks reading this would sat this is something one should never do.
Next, I kept altum angels. I want them at 6.0 onece I had them adapted to their new conditions. However, when I was getting in wild Altums I wanted them at closer to 4.0 and 30 ppm or lower for TDS. The pH tended to drift upward despite all my chemistry management. So there were times when I would add muritatic adid diectly to the tank. because a ran a conttinuous digital monitor I could see the TDS, temp; and pH constantly displayed. I would drop the ph by 1.0 in under 5 minutes and the fish never seemed to notice.
I would not use the above methods for any fish, but for the ones which come from olaces with seasonal changes which can rapidly effect the parameters, this works. What I have learned from all of the above is that there are very few hard and fast rules that aplly universally.
I also read a lot of research papers and learn from them. When it comes to water temperature almost all fish need to be in a specific range and not at a specific number. the way the science discovers the limits that range is by testing, They are looking for the high and low temps which will kils at least 50% of he fish and that becomes the red line number at each end of the range. As the temp approached these numbers the behavior or the fish changes and becoames obvious if one watches them.
One set of researchers wondered if they saw the experimental fish acting like they wer going to be duing in short order was there a way to save them from this fate. What they discovered was the best wauy to do this was to get the fish back into the proer range ASAP. What not to do wat to try and acclimate them slowly rather than doing a rapid change. Trying to acclimate them killed them nore often than not
One year when I was in the vendor room fir the NEC annula weekend event which is hald in CT in late March to early April, they was a snow storm. I always arrived on thursday evening and seto up that night. Many vendors can in friday and a few early Sat. morning. That year there was discus seller coming. They had a van specially equipped for tranporting a decent number of discus. they had a generator to power fimtraion,aeration and heaters. Durning their several hour drive the generator quit and the water in the big tank built into the van dropped srastically.
When they arrive the fish were in poor shape and they negan trying to get them saved by raising the temp. slowly, they were acclimating them. I politely explained to the about the research and that the best thing for them to do was not to acclimate but to get them into warmer water as fast as possibe. iwas told they weere discus experts and I did not know what I was talking aboiut. I walked away and over the next hour or so wathced about 80% of their discus die. This was completely unneccesary and would not have happened had they listened to me.
I will end with a quote of the chorus lyric from the Paul SImon tune:
[Chorus]
I know what I know
I'll sing what I said
We come and we go
That's a thing that I keep in the back of my head
With zebra plecos spawning does not rely on specific TDS/conductivity it happens when the parameters change, Because I was in contact with a number of zebra breeders as well as people like Hans Geor Evers, Ingo Seidel and in recent years Leandro Sousa, I have a pretty decent knowledge an experience breeding them.
The exact TDS/conductivity is not so important was is important is how much they change in response to the onset of the rainy season. What I tell people who are having trouble getting then to spawn is to run a dry.rainy simulation over several months. What ever the tds/conductivity is at the peak of the dry, I instruct them that when the time comes to do the onset of the rainy they need to drop the TD.conductivity by 50% in a matter of 36 to 48 hours.
My tap runs about 83 ppm TDS and 7.0 ph. I would use that for the rainy season. To simulate the dry I would over about 3 months raise my number so that te TDS were about 175 ppm and the pH would be allowed to drift upward s towards 7.5. My normal temp for then is in the mid 80s, anywhere from about 83F to 86F, I would be raising that parameter as well so that at the peak of the dry it was about 92F. When the time came for the rainy I waited for a storm to roll in and then did the following.
I woud do a huge water change of 50+%. First. I turned down the heater from the 92 to 78 and then unplugged it, The new water going in had the following paramters: temp. 75F, TDS 83 ppm and pH 7.0. Shortly after the water change I plugged in the heater. Then after 24 -36 hours I prepeated the water change but this time the heater was reset to the low 80s- 80-82.
I will bet you dollars to donuts that most folks reading this would sat this is something one should never do.
Next, I kept altum angels. I want them at 6.0 onece I had them adapted to their new conditions. However, when I was getting in wild Altums I wanted them at closer to 4.0 and 30 ppm or lower for TDS. The pH tended to drift upward despite all my chemistry management. So there were times when I would add muritatic adid diectly to the tank. because a ran a conttinuous digital monitor I could see the TDS, temp; and pH constantly displayed. I would drop the ph by 1.0 in under 5 minutes and the fish never seemed to notice.
I would not use the above methods for any fish, but for the ones which come from olaces with seasonal changes which can rapidly effect the parameters, this works. What I have learned from all of the above is that there are very few hard and fast rules that aplly universally.
I also read a lot of research papers and learn from them. When it comes to water temperature almost all fish need to be in a specific range and not at a specific number. the way the science discovers the limits that range is by testing, They are looking for the high and low temps which will kils at least 50% of he fish and that becomes the red line number at each end of the range. As the temp approached these numbers the behavior or the fish changes and becoames obvious if one watches them.
One set of researchers wondered if they saw the experimental fish acting like they wer going to be duing in short order was there a way to save them from this fate. What they discovered was the best wauy to do this was to get the fish back into the proer range ASAP. What not to do wat to try and acclimate them slowly rather than doing a rapid change. Trying to acclimate them killed them nore often than not
One year when I was in the vendor room fir the NEC annula weekend event which is hald in CT in late March to early April, they was a snow storm. I always arrived on thursday evening and seto up that night. Many vendors can in friday and a few early Sat. morning. That year there was discus seller coming. They had a van specially equipped for tranporting a decent number of discus. they had a generator to power fimtraion,aeration and heaters. Durning their several hour drive the generator quit and the water in the big tank built into the van dropped srastically.
When they arrive the fish were in poor shape and they negan trying to get them saved by raising the temp. slowly, they were acclimating them. I politely explained to the about the research and that the best thing for them to do was not to acclimate but to get them into warmer water as fast as possibe. iwas told they weere discus experts and I did not know what I was talking aboiut. I walked away and over the next hour or so wathced about 80% of their discus die. This was completely unneccesary and would not have happened had they listened to me.
I will end with a quote of the chorus lyric from the Paul SImon tune:
[Chorus]
I know what I know
I'll sing what I said
We come and we go
That's a thing that I keep in the back of my head
Rusty_Shackleford
Fish Crazy
- Joined
- Jan 6, 2019
- Messages
- 393
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Let's be honest, creating true soft water, acidic, blackwater.conditions without RO/DI isn't easy.
It involves preparing your water ahead of time in a large barrel or storage tank with muriatic acid. This cannot be done in tank.
It involves preparing your water ahead of time in a large barrel or storage tank with muriatic acid. This cannot be done in tank.
OP
OP
Deleted member 155206
Guest
Bloody hell since I put the thread up am beginning to have second thoughts didn’t realise it was going to be this hard I just thought getting the right decor and tanning and the advice on ro water maybe it’s not for me it’s just another expense. All my set ups are simple natural and cheap food for thought for sure
There are a few blessed locations with super soft water - esp for those who live next to the amazon river but even a few locations in the usa. but for most people yes ro unit is require (i don't use di).
I'm going to agree with @TwoTankAmin on the stability thing but a lot depends on the specific fish and type of stability. There are some fishes for which a 5 degree change in temp during water change is enough to shock them and result in them bloating up and dying. There are others where it is a norm so to speak more precisely one has to talk about locatity or species of fish but this is tangent to 'blackwater'.
Decaying plant matter (leaves and such) does seem to have a medical benfit to the fishes IF the right type of course there are leaves and such that are poisonous so one has to be at least a little careful. Generally i find that if i use ro water with an ec between 10 and 20 my aquariums will eventually stabilize with a final ec between 20 and 40 and a ph below 6.
However none of my aquariums are biotope accurate as they all include plants - this aquarium for example has a ph below 5 and ec of around 20:
In the wild you don't find any anubia, buces or (I think) such density of plants - but it works - and my fishes thrive in it as they are now over 3 years old (ownership 2 years):
OP
OP
Deleted member 155206
Guest
Am I bit curious on why you put so much plants in your tank is blackwater not from damage Forrest like falling branches leaves mangroves that sort of thing with minimal plants is that not how discus get there shape from so the can swim through those branches ?
I didn't put in so many plants - i started with this:
But you know a bit of time and a closed box without much pruning and well it kind of grew and grew and .... well you see....
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