Having chemical troubles in a remodeled tank.

[crichton013]

I recently converted my 35g bow front from artificial to planted. It's stock is a peacock eel, dragon bichir, 2 red rainbow fish, 3 giant Danios, and a blue dwarf gourami. They are the same fish that have been in the tank since I started it. I redesigned the tank adding fluorite, plants, and some driftwood. I also switched the filtration from 2 whisper 30s, To a single sunsun hw302. Since then (after cycling) the pH has been at a stead 7.8-8 and the nitrite hasn't dropped below 0.5ppm. I've used api pH down and prime to try and neutralize the chemicals but they have had little/no effect. Any tips?

I attached pictures of the old setup and the new if it helps.

 

[jarrod0987]

Prime is good for detoxifying the nitrite. It will eventually go away when the bacteria get re established. It can take a while but it will. Adding a bacterial starter can help. Many companies make them. I would take out any filter floss and add a little bacteria every day until nitrite went to 0 if I was trying to speed things along. In time it will fix itself. I also would not worry too much about Ph. If fish look fine don't try to make it go down. Changing it is more stressful to fish then leaving it high. Trust me. When I was new I killed a lot of fish with PH down. Never lost one from 8.0 ph though.

 

[claudio1]

Prime is good for detoxifying the nitrite. It will eventually go away when the bacteria get re established. It can take a while but it will. Adding a bacterial starter can help. Many companies make them. I would take out any filter floss and add a little bacteria every day until nitrite went to 0 if I was trying to speed things along. In time it will fix itself. I also would not worry too much about Ph. If fish look fine don't try to make it go down. Changing it is more stressful to fish then leaving it high. Trust me. When I was new I killed a lot of fish with PH down. Never lost one from 8.0 ph though.

+1 i have a 7.8 - 8 ph and never have problems with my fish,if you do your research online you'll find that a lot of experienced aquarist says that is always best a constant ph than using chemicals to adjust it...


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[candymancan]

Its better to have a constant PH then to strive for low or high PH levels.. For example ppl claim discus require low PH like 6.5 or so forth, i have 11 discus in my 92g that are in PH of almost 8.0.. Discus Hans who lives 2 hours from me in Baltimore who sells German Bred discus, also uses city tap water same PH as mine..


Problems with heavily planted tanks, unless you have some serious buffers in the tank, the plants will use up CO2 and this causes PH to rise. More CO2 lowers PH. Driftwood and peat lower PH as a natural buffer but eventually the wood will stop doing its Job. And if you want higher PH then you can use buffers like texas holly rocks and argonite sand and so forth.


Unless you have wild captured fish dont worry about PH