confused about h2O parameters

[Lorna]

Hi there everyone,

Im a little confused about my water. I used RO water that has gone thru a D.I. unit. I tested it yesterday and found the findings very confusing. The pH is 6.8, the kH changed after 3 drops(60). and the gH hadnt changed after 20 (<200) so I gave up. So that would mean that I have acidic, hardwater. Is this something I should be concerned about? There is nothing in the tank that would harden it either. I have a river sand substrate, river pebbles and plastic plants due to hungry Silver Dollars. If anyone could shed some light on this it would be wonderful. Thanks Lorna xx

 

[timwag2001]

what are the parameters of the non ro/di water?

 

[timwag2001]

how old is your ro/di?

 

[Lorna]

There is no problem there, we use a TDS metre and the water reading is coming up as 0.00

 

[Lorna]

Very high, we live in a hard water area. The pH of the water in this area is over 8..

 

[mfdrookie516]

my ph is over 8 where i live, but i never have any problems with fish... what happens if you fill up a bucket of water and let it sit overnight? that will help determine whether its something in your tank or just the chemistry of the water

 

[jsoong]

How old is your test kit? This might be a case of a test gone bad.

Before going nuts, test your kit with distilled water. If you can't get a color change with 1 drop, you have a dead test kit.

If you ahve R/O & DI, you should have water that is closed to distilled. The pH is right on. <It is less than 7.0 because of atmospheric CO2.> Both KH & GH should be near zero, unless you have a fault in your R/O membrane. <Hence Tim's Q on age of the filter.>

As a side note, it is not a good idea to use straight R/O in FW. There is no buffer & the tank is prone to pH shifts. Normally, you would add a buffer mix to the R/O (or baking soda). Or you can have a buffer like cc in the tank. <Your river sand might be doing that for you.> Anyways, you should test your tank's KH & pH as well. <Also test your tap to see if you really need to use the R/O.

 

[Lorna]

The testing kit is new. The reason why I started testing for the GH and KH was because my fish all of a sudden died. The guy at the pet shop suggested that I test for this to see if there was a sudden pH shift.

I added new fish into the tank which all died quickly then after a week my established fish started to get fungus and die. He suggested it was either a parasite or a prob with the water.

What would happen if you added normal tap water with a high pH into my tank? Could that of made the water very alkaline? He suggested that the water that the new fish came in could of changed the water in my tank??? Could that explain the high GH levels?

 

[timwag2001]

1)i dont see how gh and kh would have anything to do with ph.

2)prob brought in an ilness with the new fish. when you buy new fish it is suggested that you have a quarantine tank set up and that you watch your new fish for 2 weeks (some people keep them in there for a month) to see if they show any signs of illness. this way you dont contaminate your tank. my guess is that you bought sick fish.

3) if you have been using the same water the whole time from the same water source, such a high ph fluctuation isnt very likely.

4) the water that your fish came in should never be dumped into your tank. you should set them up in a bucket next to your tank and do a drip acclimation. it's kinda like doing a siphon from your tank into the bucket that the fish are in. then after a little while when your fish are acclimated to the water that is in your tank it is safe to move them there. scoop them out with a net and put them in the tank. that way the crappy water from the fish store never makes it in your tank. think about how many fish are shipped to the fish store every week, the possiblity for disease is pretty high.

5) i doubt that gh (basicly the level of magnesium and calcium) could have varied that much that it killed your fish.

 

[newfound77951]

What is the source of your tap water? City water, or well? Do you have any other water treatment in the house besides the RO system (ie a water softener)? Water parameters can and do change with the seasons but they don't usually change rapidly. That said, it's not impossible for your tap parameters to change quickly, say if you have city water and the city recently flushed lines or changed something in their water treatment facility.

Your sand certainly could be buffering the water. Where did you get it from? Also, what are your tank parameters - size, # fish, filtration, frequency and size of water changes? Any of these may be the cause of the demise of your fish.

I am curious also as to why you decided to use RO water for a FW tank. Using straight RO water is not recommended, it has no electrolytes and no buffering capacity against pH changes, and is not good for your fish. Generally fish can adapt to almost any water as long as they are properly acclimated, and the conditions don't change once they are used to it. It is far more important to have consistent parameters than "right" parameters unless you are trying to breed fish. If your tap water is really nasty (high nitrate or phosphate, etc), mixing 1/2 tap with 1/2 RO would be a good way to go, certainly cheaper than making RO and putting additives back in to reconstitute the buffering capacity of the water.

It is possible to have acidic, but hard water. I do where I live, the pH of my tap water is about 6.5 and I have over 200 ppm hardness. Fish are just fine. I do add some bicarbonate every week or so to help buffer the pH a little, as well as regular water changes.

 

[Lorna]

hi again, well I have come to the conclusion that the water I had used in the tank was contiminated as I put the fish in a completely new aqaurium with tap instead of RO. Thank you for the drip line suggestion when acclimatising the fish, it went well and was successful. The question I ask now, is about the silver dollar I thought was going to die, he was upside down at the top of the main tank last night. I saw him this morning swimming around like normal is quite happy now swimming in his new tank. He now appears to have a very slight "popeye". I have got bubbles coming out of the filter and a bubbling airline across the tank. I have read that an over saturation on O2 can cause popeye, do u think this is the cause or do you think it may be the poisoning from the original tank?? What do I do about this condition? Thanks again, Lorna x

 

[CaptainAhab]

Using straight RO water is not recommended, it has no electrolytes and no buffering capacity against pH changes, and is not good for your fish. Generally fish can adapt to almost any water as long as they are properly acclimated, and the conditions don't change once they are used to it. It is far more important to have consistent parameters than "right" parameters unless you are trying to breed fish. If your tap water is really nasty (high nitrate or phosphate, etc), mixing 1/2 tap with 1/2 RO would be a good way to go, certainly cheaper than making RO and putting additives back in to reconstitute the buffering capacity of the water.

Exactly. You need to supplement with something like RO-Right or Electro-Right to add back the electrolytes and trace elements that are stripped out of the water during filtration. Using RO/DI water in a water change can cause a huge hardness plunge and take your fish with it. You may also need to buffer the water if you need a PH higher than 7.

 

[Lorna]

I do use RO right.