Hi all, I'm having some difficulty understanding ph and was wondering if anyone would be able to lend me some knowledge?
This may go on while as I have lots of questions. So I apologise in advance.
This started about a week ago. Well...I started this about a week ago haha. Basically I've been trying to breed cherry barbs in a breeding tank after watching them spawn in my community tank. I set up a breeding tank using a matured sponge filter and water from the com tank. After 4 attempts (the 4th being last week) and not once having any of the eggs hatch I looked into my parameters and all was fine until I did the high ph test (api master test) it came back purple indicating 8.8ph! I did a test on my com tank and it read between 7.8 and 8.0 which is normal as my tap water is 8.0 ph. How can the new tank be so high? I used the water out of the same tank? The tank was cycled...well it's never shown any ammonia or nitrite on any test.
Next bit.... I've been using tropical aquacid ph minus. I done a few tests in a few buckets of tank water and worked out what I thought was the correct dosage ratio to knock the p.h down 0.2 ph at a time as to not shock the fish 1ml per 2 gallon( tank is fishless at the moment). When I applied this dosage to the 5g breeder and tested it 1 hour after dosage, it took the ph test from purple to orange which indicated it had dropped by 1.4 - 1.6 ph according to the chart. So I left it alone puzzled and confused! Lucky there was no fish. I tested it 24hrs later and the ph had gone back up to about 8.0. This is where I decided to throw the towel in and ask an expert! I dont know if this is supposed to do this? Is this stabalising? How can it fluctuate so much?
Sorry this seems to go on and on I tried to explain my situation and reasons for doing so as throughally as possible.
This may go on while as I have lots of questions. So I apologise in advance.
This started about a week ago. Well...I started this about a week ago haha. Basically I've been trying to breed cherry barbs in a breeding tank after watching them spawn in my community tank. I set up a breeding tank using a matured sponge filter and water from the com tank. After 4 attempts (the 4th being last week) and not once having any of the eggs hatch I looked into my parameters and all was fine until I did the high ph test (api master test) it came back purple indicating 8.8ph! I did a test on my com tank and it read between 7.8 and 8.0 which is normal as my tap water is 8.0 ph. How can the new tank be so high? I used the water out of the same tank? The tank was cycled...well it's never shown any ammonia or nitrite on any test.
Next bit.... I've been using tropical aquacid ph minus. I done a few tests in a few buckets of tank water and worked out what I thought was the correct dosage ratio to knock the p.h down 0.2 ph at a time as to not shock the fish 1ml per 2 gallon( tank is fishless at the moment). When I applied this dosage to the 5g breeder and tested it 1 hour after dosage, it took the ph test from purple to orange which indicated it had dropped by 1.4 - 1.6 ph according to the chart. So I left it alone puzzled and confused! Lucky there was no fish. I tested it 24hrs later and the ph had gone back up to about 8.0. This is where I decided to throw the towel in and ask an expert! I dont know if this is supposed to do this? Is this stabalising? How can it fluctuate so much?
Sorry this seems to go on and on I tried to explain my situation and reasons for doing so as throughally as possible.