[Ape-Fish]

Hey! Guys opcorn: I have a question - How sensitive are south americans to small but continuous fluctutions in pH near 7.0? I'm getting values ranging between 7.15 and 6.85 after each water change. I change the water every three or so days. Is that going to be OK on my severums, cories, head-tail light dainios, and rummy-noses?

Background - I add a tiny bit of baking soda to my tap water to raise the pH from ~6.5 to 7.0 each water change. The tap water is totally soft so i need only 1/2 teaspoon per 20 gallons of water to reach pH 7.0. That's not much buffering and my measurements are by eye, which may be leading to the fluctuations. The tap water is know to fluctuate a bit too. Oh, btw - i also add the same ammount of epsom salts to get a tiny bit of gH into the water, since there is zero from the tap, and this probably also varies proportionately to the pH and very near zero - say ~.15.

 

[Dutch Dude]

The small fluctuation in PH won't be a problem. Is your buffer enough to keep the tank stable and will it be healthy over time? I have the opposite situation over here and need to put in RO water so I can't give you proper advice on buffering. Maybe someone more experienced on this subject can jump in.

 

[dwarfpike]

Your rummynose will be your indicators here, if the red starts to fade ... then they aren't liking something. You deffinately don't need to buffer the pH, all those fish would be prefer the 6.5 over the 7.0 anyway. But having a touch of gH helps keep the pH from crashing suddenly.

 

[remarkosmoc]

kh protects you from ph fluctuations not gh

 

[DeadFishFloating]

I dream of having tap water with a PH of 6.5. I would definately go along with dwarfpike's suggestion of not buffering your tap water. It's pretty much made for most SA fish.

 

[Nighthawk]

I dream of having tap water with a PH of 6.5. I would definately go along with dwarfpike's suggestion of not buffering your tap water. It's pretty much made for most SA fish.

My pH is 6.5 out of the tap. I keep severums, bp's, and clown loaches. I can't figure out why the OP is raising the pH. His fish should be fine with the water out of the tap.

 

[Dutch Dude]

A PH of 6.5 would be perfect but no measurable buffer would make me woried as well. The PH out of the tap is fine but the KH / GH is the problem. Oooh by the way,....how relaieble is your KH and GH test kit? Maybe it is wise to let it check at the lfs or with a diferent test kit just to make sure.

 

[Ape-Fish]

Thanks for the help guys!

So, my test kit has ben checked and is OK, thanks Dutch Dude.

Apparently my tap water comes from a rain reservoir near my town, so it has no dissernable hardness at all - virtually distilled except for the chloramine, and i know fish can't live in pure H2O...

 

[dwarfpike]

Where in BC is that??? Might have to move!!! :lol:

 

[Dutch Dude]

Where in BC is that??? Might have to move!!!

:lol:

Amazingly some fish need water like this. Heckel Discus is one of them. Most fish do need some minerals indeed. So if I was in your situation I would have buffered the water to a KH of 2 to get more stability along with a GH around 5. The only thing with buffering is that things can go wrong if you don't pay enough atention. Maybe you could do something with the substrate,....mix in some beach sand? Just an idea and I don't know how well this works. Maybe someone can respond to this.

 

[kornphlake]

Where in BC is that??? Might have to move!!! :lol:

It sounds a lot like the water here in Portland, I thought Seattle had very soft water as well.

I don't do anything to my tap water, it usually comes out of the tap at about 7.0 pH, then drops to around 6.8 pH after 24 hours. I don't let my tap water age though, I don't usually do more than a 30% water change, nobody seems to mind. I've only had one crash in a 10g where I was using too much fertilizer and the pH fell below 4.0, suprisingly my tetras survived. I've kept some CA species that should have harder water but they seem to do okay in the softer acidic water, they have all been bred locally in the same water conditions so I'm sure that helps too.

 

[dwarfpike]

It is soft, but not that soft!! That's perfect for breeding my noto's as they come from the same waters as altum angels and heckeli discus. Still need RO water for those ultra blackwater species here. It is perfect for clear or white water fish without altering at all though.