PH questions

[Stephanie]

I've never really been a big ph checker. All of my fish have seemed to do ok over the years. But my goldfish and cory cats have had fluke problems lately, and so I've been testing PH. I'm confused! My tapwater is naturally 7.6. When I checked my goldfish tank's water today, the ph was very, very low. It looked to be around 6.3-6.5. What the heck could be causing this? I can't find any info on what causes ph to drop. I'm using a medicine called Paragon. Its for external parasites. I do a small water change every couple of days, and add more medicine as intructed on the box. Could this be the cause? Also, it slightly tinges the water a barely noticable yellow. Could this effect the test?

I've been doing research on proper PH for different kinds of fish. The range seems so large. Can someone tell me a specific ph for goldfish and corydoras?

Thanks,

Steph

 

[justDIY]

it may be your water is very soft, and has no buffer against wide PH swings ... as soon as anything acidic gets into the water (co2, medicine, etc), the PH quickly drops

do you use a water softener in your home, or is your city water soft? You can harden your water by using a few sea shells, a piece of marble or some of those agronite chips (only a few) ... this will put calcium into the water, allowing it to retain it's normal ph better

goldfish probably don't care much about PH, as long as it's not toxicly high or low

catfish probably like their water neutral to slightly acidic, but there are some that prefer alkaline water ... do you know what species of corydoras you have? check out www.planetcatfish.com, they have tons of info on all sorts of catfish

 

[TankGirl]

As your tank ages the pH generally drops, a part of "old tank syndrome" so if you have had your tank set up for a few years this may be the reason. If your tap is consistent then just do more water changes than normal and it will come back up. If your fish are happy then I would not worry about it! It is the drastic changes in pH that cause the fish to suffer.