Rising PH level (newbee Q)

[trustnoone]

Good day,

I have a 15 GA community tank with a Beta, 5 red eye tetras, a red tail shark, albino catfish, and a mystery snail.

I do weekly maintenance but I live in a small town with high PH and high iron, and probably hard water.

When I bring the PH level down to 7.0 with Nutrafin PH Adjust Down, it will rise back to 7.6 over night. I tested a sample I took from the tank and it did the same after 24 hours. From the tap the water is 7.6-7.8.

Should I be looking at my KH/GH levels? Should I even be worried unless I want to add some fish?

Thanks,

TNO

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

Tap water at that pH is just fine for most fish, you don't need to have neutral pH unless you're planning on keeping specific fish which require it. African Cichlids prefer higher pH for example.

My tap water (municipal) comes out of the tap around 9 and stabilizes in the tank after a few days to around 8, then after a week it drops to around 7.4 or 7.8. I keep livebearers and they handle the water changes (35-45% weekly) just fine (which swings the pH drastically) even my fry have no problems.

I wouldn't add any pH Down or Up, you're basically adding acid or base straight to the water, and it temporarily appears to solve the problem but the issue is more related to your KH (GH not so much) because that acts as your pH buffer. The higher the value of that (dissolved carbonates) the better your water will maintain it's pH from what I understand.

Personally, I wouldn't to a thing to your water, and if it's not cholrinated, it might contain some heavy metals and other toxins, so you may still want to use Prime for detoxification. I would have your tap water professionally tested to see exactly what you are dealing with, then you know if you need to do anything.

I grew up on well water and ours had a lot of something that caused green water algae blooms, I have to run a diatom filter (Magnum) with diatomacious earth (basically a pool filter) to get whatever it was out right after water changes to keep it at bay.

 

[mfdrookie516]

Dont worry with the ph that much. Consistancy is more important than numbers in almost all fw fish. A steady 7.4 is much better than 7.0-6.8-7.4... even small changes are big to the fish...

 

[mgamer20o0]

like the others said i wouldnt add that stuff to your tank. just leave the tap water alone.

 

[johnny_zanni]

the only things you should use if you are worried and want it down are peat or driftwood