Ph dip...hmmmm

[SCFatz]

This is a new one.My tank has been cycled for about two weeks I guess.

Today it tested:

Somthing just higher then 0 ammonia..Odd.
0 nitrites
and between 5 and 10 nitrates.

But the ph is a solid 6.6 ...checked twice with the liquid kit.

Now because my tank was cycling with fish I have done heaps of water changes over the last two months and the ph has always tested at 7.0.Always.But I suspect thats why the ph was always in check.

Over the last two weeks i've done two 50% changes (cycle complete).Its been a few days since I checked for ph,but this is the first dip I have ever had,so for me its a new issue.

I know I can just add the ph up stuff,but I'd rather not.I'd rather get to the bottom of the problem as opposed to treat the symptom if thats possible.I've managed to keep the tank "artificial" free up until now with the help of you guys and would prefer to keep it that way...but I'll do what I must.

What drives it down?Will it keep trending that way?How should I handle the problem?How low is too low?

I'm giving live plants a shot so I'd rather not just change the water more often as I've read here the nitrates are essential.

Fwiw...each (two) sword plant has one browning leaf...and they are a few days old in the tank if that helps.

Thoughts?

thanks as always,
Fatz

 

[jcarlilesiu]

Hey fatz... ill see if i can help you out. First of all you are right I would steer away from any chemical PH controls. All these are is a temporary fix and a small mistake can be a disaster.

6.6 PH isn't something to fret over first of all. A stable PH is much more important than an ideal one. What I suggest you do is leave a cup of tap water out over night and test the PH of the water you keep doing water changes with. This may help explain this sudden drop. Water coming out of your faucet may be very soft, which means that its ability to buffer PH due to outside influences (CO2 among others) is very very low. There are ways to raise your PH more naturally like using crushed coral in your filter if its really important for you to bring it up. A KH/GH test kit will help us to analyize how soft your water is, and may lead to the cause.

As far as the browning leaves go, what size tank is it, what kind of substrate, do you use fertalizers and what type of lighting and watts. This information is important to understand if your plants have everything they need to flourish.

As far as reducing nitrates by doing water changes, this isn't always a bad thing. Sword plants are nutrient hogs, and even with a pretty heavy bio-load of fish in the tank, a growing sword may still eat through nitrates faster than the fish naturally produce it. I would keep up on water changes as normal and possible consider dosing nitrate artifically. There are some good stickies in the planted tank forum on dosing. HTH

 

[YuccaPatrol]

6.6 is not a terrible pH as long as you don't have fish that desperately need high pH.

If you have added driftwood, that could be a source of a pH drop.

But the concern is that you may be having a pH "crash". This happens when your water does not have the buffering capacity to maintain a stable pH. The way to test this is to get a KH test kit which measures carbonate hardness. If your KH is low, then that would be the explanation.

So what can you do naturally? Add some crushed coral in a mesh bag (old panty hose works great) into your filter and that will naturally raise KH, GH and pH.

It sounds like you already know not to monkey around with odd chemicals that LFS sells to fix any problem, and that is a good thing.

 

[jcarlilesiu]

I hear an echo... ok we are posting at the same time on several threads haha

 

[SCFatz]

Thanks for the replies guys.Tested at 6.8 today so I guess its all good.