Making your water softer

[pjeff]

I was gunna get 2 german blue rams and i was wondering how to get the water to become more soft

 

[smb]

Have you thought of trying peat moss or ro?

 

[thecichlidaddict]

R/O is the only stable method that I know of - almost every other method is short term and unstable.

What are your water parameters at? Cichlids tend to be much more forgiving then given credit for. If your water is not too alkaline then it's probaby fine.

 

[pjeff]

I have a ten gallon and the and my ph is 6.8 and i have no tracable nitrates or nitrites the water is very hard i use plant fretilizeers and i have lots of plants
I was gunna get a breeding pair of rams and i was wondering what would be the best breeding paramaters

 

[Exiled]

What's R/O ?

 

[thecichlidaddict]

pjeff, a PH of 6.8 is perfect, there is no reason to start messing with it.

Exile R/O is Reverse Osmosis, and advanced filtration system that removes pretty much everything from the water, both good and bad.

 

[jaywings19]

Sorry for chiming in here... but I thought the original question asked was about making water softer... not lower the pH. Am I missing something here? I thought water hardness and pH are two distinct water characteristics.

 

[thecichlidaddict]

Good point Jaywings, but people just tend to say 'soft' and 'hard' when referring to the combined elements of PH, GH, and KH. Of course, realistically PH is acid, neutral, or alkaline, while GH is hard or soft. GH barely matters anyway.

 

[carppy]

water hardness also affects the waters ability to stabliize the ph levels....my bolivian rams were fine in the tap water here, and it is very hard..you could use a water softener pillow made be doc wellfish or you could use peat moss, both soften the water