Do I Need To Worry

[chilly1967]

Hi, I have a 180 litre aquarium with about 30 fish, i have just lost 2 African dwarf frogs so did a water test, everything was fine except the PH level, it was 7.8.
do i need to worry about that level? is that excessively high?
will a good water change lower the level?

I also have a very aggressive albino sharf who seems to rule the tank and chases the other fish around, we think he caused one of our gourami to die, should i get rid of him??

 

[SchottayB]

If you have an agressive fish in a non agressive tank that's constantly after other fish, i'd guess the best thing to do was re-home the agressive fish.

Not sure about the Ph though, someone else will be along shortly to awnser that i'm sure

 

[chilly1967]

Thanks for the fast reply, thats what i was thinking about the shark, he constantly chases the blue Gourami and the female died a few weeks ago,
back to the shop with him!!

not sure if he had a hand in the frogs dying?

 

[waterdrop]

Hi chilly and welcome to the beginners section!

Good decision. Around the beginners section we say they don't call'em sharks for nothin! Its very much the case the fish can "worry" other fish to death.

pH is not a measurement that has a "best" or "correct" value for all tanks. A good value depends on all the fish you keep and a good compromise number for those species. A good general way we sometimes think about this to simplify it is that if we have a lot of fish that originate in the Amazon, such as neon/cardinal tetras, many other tetras, Angels and some of the other amazonian cichlids, then we know a tank with soft, acid water will be more suitable for them. If we have a tank with livebearers and especially mollies or african cichlids, we know a tank with hard, alkaline/basic water might be appreciated or needed.

But the beginner basic that trumps other considerations is that fish need -stability- (lack of change) in mineral content (various hardness scales are ways to measure different aspects of mineral content) and pH is often a number that is an indirect indication of hardness, although it can change as a result of other things too.

Another thing we like to ask newcomers is how they took their tests (what kit manufacturer and model of water test kit) and what numbers they got that they interpreted as "fine." Let us know the answer to that in your case.

~~waterdrop~~