Ph A Pain In The Butt

[Jabba]

How do you guys manage pH, I can't even get mine into a zone where I can read it ... test kit colour never changes and its bottom range is 6.4 .... and this is out of the tap !!!

Then the water is hard, and by hard I mean it is only one colour box from the maximum ....

Everything else reads OK ....

But some of my fish ain't happy ..... one platy is, another isn't with all fins closed against the body and hiding in the plants, another has dark bands appearing at the tips of his fins but seems OK, another is swimming nose down ... and a neon just up and disappeared .... one of the small Silver dollars died, the other small silver dollar is also nose down, and yet the big (5 inch) Silver dollar that was real sick with fungus and such now seems to be coming around with no sign of fungus or 'slime'.

I did two 25% water changes this week to try and get the hardness down and failed, I treated the water I put in with Aquasafe, I also made sure it was 24 to 26 degrees ....

What is going on

Is it pH .... or something else ..... what can I use that is non chemical that will increase the pH in tank?

Its hard not to fiddle when things aren't lining up like the books say they should and I am sure it upsets the inhabitants.

 

[yvez9]

I wouldn't worry so much about pH

First off, is the tank cycled?

Secondly, take your time adapting the fish to your water when you bring them home. If your pH is really low and the store's is higher, take lots of time, like 2 hours to adapt them slowly.

 

[WILDER]

Platys need a 7 range, what your ammonia reading as black patches can be ammonia burns that are healing.
Need to look at the size of tank in gallon or litres, and full stock list of fish in the tank.
And nitrite,nitrate reading, and whats your tap ph.

Need to answer these questions so we can see what going off in your tank, as if you have a high ammonia reading it can fetch ph down to acidic.
The more you can fill us in with information the more we can help.

Sorry thought when you said hard you meant hard water.
What test kit are you using and can you answer some of the question been asked.

 

[voo]

Hard water is usually alkaline, but with a pH of 6.4 your water is acidic.
You could add crushed coral / coral grit to your filter, that will bring your ph up to 7, but slowly.

 

[Jabba]

Hi,

I did mean hard water, in the tank, out the tap I think it is battery acid and doesn't really produce any discernable colour change, the numbers are below and make no sense, test kit is a Precision Labs test strip kit.
------------------ TAP -----------------

pH = 6.4 or less
Alkalinity KH = 53.4
Hardness GH = 0 !!
Nitrate = 445
Nitrite = 0
Ammonia = 0

------------------- TANK --------------
pH = 6.4 or less
Alkalinity = 53.4
Hardness GH = 249
Nitrate = 445
Nitrite = 0
Ammonia = 0

Tank is very mature, 25 gallon, about 12 inches of fish

3 Neon tetras
1 Cardinal Tetra
2 Silver dollars (one is 5 inches nose to tail)
3 Platies
2 - brown with horizontal bands that I can't identify - look a bit like a platy ...

So far (in last two weeks) I have done 3 25% water changes, I feel another coming on - where is this hardness coming from?, if I mess with the hardness I am worried that I will also make the pH even lower - and I already can't measure it. I have nothing like limestone in the tank the plants are plastic, two resin rocks, the gravel was there when I 'acquired' the tank.

I'll see if I can get a picture into members tanks .....

Yes I know I need to invest more in testing compared to you guys but I have already turned the best part of £400 into tank management and filtration ...

70 foot Python for water changes - buckets and stuff in the lounge / through the house - I should say not - actually she did - say not I mean,

New Rena Air 400 pump - The Interpet was far too noisy for the lounge and was uncontrollable,

Hydor under gravel heating and Hydroset external stat - The internal in the tank not reliable - checked water temp in three places with calibrated probe and it was 28 degrees - heater was set at 24, set it to 22 and it still misbehaved,

Power Gravel Washer - the filter was clearly a bio hazard zone, yuch, took hours to get to the point where I could distinguish the gravel had colours.

External Eheim wet & Dry filter - The under gravel was all this tank had.

Several books

..... and still shopping (want me an Aqua One Truview 1230XL)... this is not a cheap hobby.

 

[Irf]

Hi Jabba,

I can only comment on a couple of things.....

1. GH of 0 is bizarre - have you checked this several times?

2. When you say the tank is very mature, how long has it actually been running with water in it?

3. I don't know the test kit you mention, but then I am not much more than a beginner myself. So long as a few people her mention it and rate it as OK, then you shouldn't need a new one.

4. Internal heater thermos are almost always off in their set and measured temps. That's what I hear anyway. I pay no attention to the dial reading. Instead go by whatever your separate water thermo reads.

Irf.

 

[annka5]

Odd... very odd... Readings from the tap can be slightly off due to the water having lower concentrations of dissolved gases in it; I don't reckon this is enough to explain the gH readings though.
Have a really careful inventory of everythin in the tank which could affect hardness - I reckon your gravel is the most likely culprit, test this by seeing if vinegar fizzes if you add it to a bit of the gravel.
Check your test kit either by taking a sample of tank water to the LFS and asking them to test it, or using it to measure water of known paramaters - e.g. bottled mineral water.
Part of why the fish might look unhappy could be the stocking - neons and cardinals often will shoal together, but a group of 3 isn't really enough; also I think 5" SD would need more swimming space ideally; it sounds like you started with a bigger group in the same size tank. I don't know much about SD's though.
GH tests can often really be reacting to anything in there, i.e. any mineral salts.

 

[Jabba]

I agree - GH = 0 = bizarre, I have tested three times now and the test stick just never changes color, I am going to take a sample of both tank and tap to my LFS tomorrow.

As for the SD no I got the smaller SD's to keep the big one company, I inherited the tank with a house move and he was all on his onesies in there, I did the same for the tetra before I found out he was a cardinal not a neon ... dohhh ...

 

[voo]

Strip tests arent that accuate, you'd be better off getting a liquid test kit

 

[annka5]

Well, if you acquired the tank with the house, then you don't really know how old the fish are or how they've been treated up till now... and it sounds like tehy're getting good care now.
My bet is that it's the gravel that's causing the issue.