Stocking for 29 gallon

[JennaNiccole]

Hello again

I currently have a 29 gallon with pencilfish and celestial pearl danios. I was originally thinking that I wanted to keep a pair apistos in it, because I've wanted to keep apistos for years and I finally have a big enough setup for a pair. The problem is though, I'm using tap water and having trouble keeping my pH down below 7.2; my goal was 6.8 but the water is impossible to get below 7.0 unless I don't change the water for a month. I've been trying peat in the filter, driftwood, and hoping the Aqua Soil would lower the pH like it does in my 5, but I'm not having much luck. I know there are chemical additives (I used proper pH 7.0 until I had plants) but I've also read they're difficult to keep exact.

So my question is, do you think I can get the pH low enough with driftwood or other methods, or should I just hold off on getting apistos until I get around to investing in a RO system? I've wanted apistos forever, but I'd rather not have them at all than have them die on me due to water problems.

The original stocking plan was:
Apistogramma Cacatuoides- 2
Celestial Pearl Danio- 12
Pencilfish- 10
Snail (assassin or mystery)- 1

but now I'm thinking maybe I should just stick with a higher pH and go with:

Celestial Pearl Danio- 12
Pencilfish- 10-12
Emerald Dwarf Rasbora/Danio Erythromicron- 10-12
Scarlet Badis- 10-12
Snail (assassin or mystery)- 1

What do you think?

 

[nirbhao]

If you're trying to get your pH below 7, then don't do a snail. The calcium carbonate in their shells will dissolve.

Emerald dwarf rasboras are gorgeous. I had never heard of erythromicron, and my brain immediately went to erythromycin. Silly.

You'd have some gorgeous schools of tiny, colorful, sparkling fish. It would be wonderful to watch.

Your pencilfish are dwarf?

So, you have plants. Have you considered CO2? That will drop your pH quite a bit.

 

[Sjasmin888]

Something you should keep in mind is that captive bred fish are more forgiving to ph than wild caught. It's more important to keep your ph stable and properly acclimate than it is to match your ph to the exact preference of the fish. Wild caught fish are more sensitive and can't handle ph much higher or lower than their natural environment, but captive bred fish tend to be bred in differing ph leveled and so can take differing ph with proper acclimation. There are exceptions like discus, angel fish..this is my personal experience. I don't keep apistos, but I do keep german blue rams successfully in a ph of 7.6.

 

[JennaNiccole]

Ahh thank you for reminding me about the snails and pH!! Hopefully I'd have remembered that before I actually tried keeping a snail in there . I'll move the snail to a higher pH tank, then. I already have 1 mystery and 1 assassin snail, but one at a time lives in my betta tank and the other is in the 29 since my pH is always above 7 anyway.

I think I've solved my stocking problem at least in terms of being able to get all the fish I like, by buying another 10 gallon tank on craigslist (Well, two actually, but I'm going to keep the 6 gallon as a quarantine/hospital/CPD breeder tank, whatever I need at the moment.)

I'll keep the 29 with CPDs, pencilfish, and maybe some WCMMs. Then I can add an apisto pair in the future, or not, but I don't have to decide now because I have more options to move fish around while figuring out pH.

My new 10 gallon will be a planted microrasbora tank, and I'll keep the microrasbora kubotai (6,) danio erythromicron (6,) and maybe scarlet badis (3) in there as well, along with my mystery snail.

I haven't really thought about CO2 since my light is pretty low output so I wasn't sure if it would end up being too much? But I'll definitely look into it again as a way to drop pH, thank you!!

 

[JennaNiccole]

And I have read that most fish can adapt to any pH, but I've also read that apistos are often an exception to that rule. I'm not sure if that's true though, it might depend on the species? Cockatoo apistos especially are usually pretty adaptable so maybe they will be okay in a pH above 7.

I'm really impressed your rams do well at 7.6! I had one for a couple months a long time ago in a highish pH, but I lost him. I've always assumed it was my pH being high (can't remember exactly where it was, different state and much different water) but I was pretty new to fish at the time so it really could have been anything.