plants and hydroxide

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ldaniel

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Apr 17, 2011
Messages
150
Location
Grand Junction, CO
As plants in the aquarium grow, will they put off hydroxides? What can be the cause of a rising pH when everything is set to have the pH stay steady or lowering during lights on?
Any ideas?
Thanks.
 
Plants release Co2 at night, which reacts with the water to make Carbonic Acid (maybe?) either way thats the dip in PH, making the water slightly more acidic at night
 
I currently have a DIY co2 system and and maintained a pH of about 6.8 - 7.0 up until about a week ago. Since then I have tested all my parameters and the pH is rising, Ca and Mg are dropping as well as my iron has gone from .5 ppm to less than .01 ppm.
The plants have grown in peps and bounds in this past week. I have about doubled size / length in my cabamba, and African oak.
I have lost about three of my adult glass shrimp.
I am running walnut in my filter to add some tannin and try to keep the kh in check.
 
A DiY Co2 system is by definition a little inconsistent, so its possible that your formula might be overproducing (or under) for some reason, and increasing (or decreasing) the Co2 you used to have. I've never heard of running walnut in a filter, that's really interesting! Do you have a websites on hand with literature about that? I googled it, but to no avail. Also, Tannins in water is actually Tannic Acid, which will drop your ph, but not to a very large degree.

How are you testing your PH? is it a titration kit? if so, those can be a bit unreliable. Aquarium PH is constantly changing, the only way to get a truly exact measurement is with a probe.

With your plant growth as much as it it, and depending on your substrate and lighting, you might consider some sort of ferts, to balance the iron and other minerals the plants are absorbing. Of course water changes will do this for you as well, so thats up to you. Test your tap water, or where ever you're adding water from, to see if it has a low KH. Ie really soft water. If so, then it could be the water your adding is low. You can fix that with Baking Soda, or if you bake your Baking Soda you can have Sodium Carbonate, which also can fix it. One raises PH, one lowers....i think anyways.

Finally, what kind of lamp are you using?
 
Can I attach an excel file to this site?
I currently work in a lab for an oil and gas company. We add walnut to the cement slurries (byproduct is tannic acid - tannins) to decrease the pH - thus increasing the time to cure.
I have been using a Hach digital titrator to measure; alkalinity (as CaCO3), Ca and total hardness (Mg) (as CaCO3), Hach Session pH probe, Spectrophotometer to measure Sulfates, total FE, and potassium. I also check conductivity, salinity, and TDS. About every other week I test for Dissolved Organics (tannin and lignin’s) as well as Turbidity.
My tap water has a dKH of about 6, I am now adding Seachem Flourish Balance (a Gh buffer) and have had great results with it.
I also dose KNO3 and Flourish Iron about twice a week on alternating days.
I am running a duel T5 HO set up, 10K and 6700K, for my lighting system. The temp stays pretty stable at around 78F.
Thanks
 
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