Help please, on the verge of giving up.

[Rivercats]

Kh is the Carbonate Hardness of the tank, meaning the amount of alkalinity and buffering capacity. Without adequate Kh, which should be at least 4, not enough buffers are in the water to retain a stable Ph. Gh is General Hardness and refers to the amount of calcium and magnesium ions in the water which tells how hard or soft water is. Again a Gh or 4 is perfect for a planted tank.

The Crushed Coral will not bother the fish BUT you have to go slowly only starting with a small amount and slowly increasing it until you reach a Gh and Kh of 4. I would seriously suggest buying an API Gh and Kh testing kit. It has tests for both Gh and Kh testing in it. If you just go by Ph your not going to know what the other numbers are and they are more important than Ph IMO.

 

[vao71]

When I set the tank up I had to immediately move all my fish from my 55 to the 125 as hurricane sandy basically ruined that tank, the parameters were off the charts and there was a fungus going around, so I moved all the health fish over to the 125 with the brand new fx5 on it and the established marine land 350 so the filters had plenty of ammonia to feed on with all the fish added.

 

[vao71]

I'll definitely pick up those tests after work, thanks a lot

 

[vao71]

So just some updates in case anyone's interested. After daily water changes and adding about 6 tablespoons of CC to the tank in a stocking underneath the outflow here are the results:
The ph is still off the charts
The ammonia is about 4.0 ppm
My favorite fish that I've had for almost a year has died (BGK)
And all my plants are dying/dead


I remember when this hobby used to be fun..

 

[Sambo7475]

this is going to sound strange, but do you have a decaying fish or other animal in there somewhere? The ammonia has to be coming from somewhere. I'd try to get all of the dead/decaying plant matter out too.
I know the feeling of "remembering when this was fun" well. It will get back there, but I understand why lots of people leave the hobby too.

 

[Teakwood]

Just keep up with lots of water changes as much as you can to keep your toxins down. Do you know someone with an established filter you could have some media from to speed up the re-cycling process? If the tap ph is 7 then big water changes should help bring it up I would think.

 

[owen0992]

I get the feeling. I always get a bit peeved when a fish gets sick when I have good parameters. It happens though. But I agree, something is decaying in your tank somewhere. If a lot of plants are decaying that could be the source.

 

[Teakwood]

Also since prime water conditioner neutralizes ammonia I would use that and do daily water changes to keep ammonia down/detoxified. Prime also has a way you can use it to detoxify nitrites as well, but it involves using lots of the prime... I would research it a bit to see how long its safe to use that much prime. It will get better!!!!

 

[Rivercats]

What is your ph? If it's still low add 1/4 teaspoon baking soda to get some buffer into the water. Ammonia won't start processing until ph is at least above 6.5

Then once you get ph up getting some seeded media would help alot.

 

[vao71]

Now that you mention it..I have this stupid decoration that my 3 clown loaches love to hide in and lately I've only been seeing 2 exploring the tank at a time, I can't really see inside this monstrous decoration without turning it upside down and taking it out of the water so god forbid their might be a dead one in there

 

[vao71]

And yea it's daily water changes with prime for me. I also just cleaned my filter for the first time today

 

[owen0992]

I'd check that decoration just in case.