Strange Water

[Mr._Fishy]

We have a water softener in our house and when we turn it on the water's ph jumps to 8.4 and turns very soft. The rock salt that we put into the water softener says that it is 99.98% pure salt. I don't know what the other .02% is. I don't use this water for my fish tanks, but what could cause the ph and water softness to react this way? I always thought that water was usually soft and acidic or hard and alkaline or something along those lines. I don't know if this helps, but the water has a ph of 6.6 to begin with and a gh of 75.

Thanks in advance,
Ryan

 

[GuppyDude]

My parents house has the exact same kind of system, and the PH was always 8-8.5. I simply used the water straight from the facet with a little conditioner. I loved it because i could usually count on the PH being fairly predictable. I keep guppies, so they adapted quite well to it, though it depends on the fish you keep. Some may demand particular PH levels. 6.6 is pretty acidic, i wouldn't use that. But there are cichlid and other fish species that actually prefer a harder water PH.