Ph

[El chakas]

So I have a community tank with mostly live breaders and some life plants. My PH has been at about 8.4. I tested my tap water (water that I use for water changes) and it's at 8.4 also. I know the best way is to use RO water.

So I went out and bought the seachem neutral regulator. Used half the dosage and ph went down to 8.0 over night. Question is. What is a safe ph level for both my plants and fish?

What are some natural causes of ph to increase or decrease.

I will go out and buy 5gal jugs to do RO water changes.

 

[bud29]

Honestly, ph is one of the more over-emphasized parameters in our hobby. As long as your water isn't ridiculously acidic or ridiculously alkaline, most plants and fish will be perfectly fine. Especially livebearers, lots of which being native to pretty hard, alkaline waters.

As far as natural methods of manipulating ph, adding something like peat moss to your filter will help make things more acidic, but will also stain your water with tannins a bit. Mixing RO water with tap water is probably the easiest and most exact way of doing things - I invested in a RO/DI unit a few years ago and it was a very good purchase. This wasn't necessarily due to ph however, it was more of a means to eliminate the other nasty things from my tap water. If ph is the ONLY thing you're having issues with, I wouldn't bother.

 

[2xEcho]

I have read that some of the ph regulators are not safe for planted aquariums. Make sure to read the fine print on those products and they are ok to add to a planted tank.
Driftwood helps to slightly lower ph, but it may also stain your water a little if not pre-boiled.

 

[El chakas]

I read all the label and couldn't find anything on damaging plants. Other brands did say that though. I also have some drift wood but they are not helping with lowering ph. I know the best way to lower it is changing the water with RO water. Just wanted to hear people's opinions

 

[mambee]

My advice is to not mess with your ph. If you do, you are going to have wild swings during water changes. Stable ph is much more important than correct ph.

Add driftwood to help lower ph, add crushed coral to raise ph.

With such a high ph, you can go with the flow and stock fish which like alkaline water: African cichlids from Malawi, Tanganyika, or Victoria; livebearers such as guppies, swordtails or mollies; Rainbowfish, etc. Given lemons, make lemonade.

 

[El chakas]

Thanks. I still I will take that advice. My tank if only livebreaders and I was worried because my last batch of fish all died one by one for some unknown reason. I upgraded my filter and monitoring my tank more. My fish have been good and healthy so far for a couple weeks now

 

[Delapool]

Phosphate based buffers have given me problems in the past. Not so much with algae problems but that the plants didn't seem to appreciate it. Different product to seachem though.

If your fish shop tests kh it would be useful to know carbonate hardness. If tap kh is high than the first water change will negate any ph decrease that has been tried ime.