Ph Issues

[debstep]

OK Our established tanks (Grow out, 2'6" , 3' and 5 ' )all stay around 6-6.5, our new and breeding tanks want to be at 7-7.2, PH up/ph down don't affect them much Suggestions?? Deb & Step :byebye:

[najrick]

I'm not sure there is much you can do with PH that just won't change other than keep using PH down / up etc and IMO that has it's own risks. Our water sits on PH 7.5. It's that all the time and never changes no matter what we do. It comes out of the tap at PH 8 and after we add PH down, salt, peat and bannana leaf / ketapang leaf and then aged it, it settles down to PH 7.5. Every tank and the barracks is the same. The only exception is our general tropical tank which slowly drops to about 5.5 - 6.0 and we have no idea why it does that. There is a nice log in there but it is the same bit of log that is in a seperate betta grow out tank which has PH 7.5. Out water is only slightly hard out of the tap but the calcium level is quite high which is why I think our PH stays where it is. The build up of calcium on our barracks jars needs a bit of cleaning every now and then but it is never too bad. The addition of bannana, peat and ketapang has affected the hardness a little and it certainly feels soft and the bubbles stick together forever. But it still doesn't explain why the tropical tanks PH drops. The Angels love it and all the other fish don't seem to mind including female bettas, guppies, barbs and bristlenose. It is actually our easiest tank to maintain with water changes every 3 weeks and has been going for about 2 years now with no health / disease issues. Regarding all our other water and tanks we've tried adding more PH down to our water, doubled the amount of bannana / ketapang but it doesn't seem to have much effect on the PH. And I am loath to just keep adding chemicals to drop the PH. I guess it's a question of how much do you have to add and does it actually make any difference to the fish? Overall we are content with having PH 7.5 and if it means not having to add too many chemicals to get that "desired" PH then so be it. So I guess it doesn't answer the question at all really. Sorry But I'm not too sure what you can do. If I could explain why one tank in the house drops it's PH while every other stays the same maybe I'll come closer to an answer. But from what I can see every aspect of the tank is the same as the others such as plants, logs, rocks, gravel. The only difference is a few different species of fish. Pat.

[debstep]

I know thats why it is driving us mad They have the same gravel etc, our tap water is 6.8-7.5 and reasonably soft, same additives and only 3 have wood (including the 7.2 tank) Does anyone use buffers and are they OK? I am thinking of a 6.5 buffer for all of them to try and even it out a bit. We have a 'sale' tank where we alter ph to 7 over a period of a month or so before selling but it only fits so many and we will have a lot for sale over the next 3 weeks..., We can't send to the Royal as the Brissie water makes them sick unless we have conditioned them as per our sale fish to ph7 and harder water It is SO frustrating.... (PS the imports do love it I must admit) Deb & Step

[Callatya]

What type of gravel is it? What colour? I had a tank with black gravel that sat at 8.2 for months before it finally dropped to something more reasonable, and I found out later that black and white gravel have a tendency to do that. I'm pretty sure its supposed to be a permanent thing, mine must have just leached out a lot to start with and then levelled off.

[debstep]

Our gravel is standard old mixed gravel from various pet stores/supplies with pretty much the same in each tank. Bugger Deb