Low pH levels

[Joannajj]

200L tank
3 goldfish
pH - 6.0
Nitrate - 5ppm
Nitrite - 0ppm
Ammonia - 0.50ppm

Hi guys, my pH has been sitting at 6.0 for a couple of weeks now, and my pleco has died since.

I’ve done a couple of 50% water changes, added pH up, added a pH raiser block, removed driftwood, tank is super clean, but the pH still isn’t budging. I’ve also removed the few plants I had in there (which the goldfish ate most of anyway).

I’m afraid I’ve also crashed my cycle as my nitrate (which is usually high) is almost non-existent but my ammonia has been switching between 0.50ppm to 1.0ppm in this time.

Should I go an buy some coral substrate? Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[Autumnsky]

You might just need some magnesium. You can check into adding some dissolved plain, nothing added pharmacy Epsom Salts which is magnesium sulfate, and possibly some calcium powder.

If you can do a GH/KH test and see what you find mainly with the kH it could be very useful.

What kind of dechlorinator are you using? Some types use different methods of binding the chlorine and if you already have low KH and you use a type which uses calcium to bind with it, you can crash your tank. Personally have had that terrible experience. Others use O2. And I am not a chemist so my knowledge is limited and the intricate details of all the ways those things work.

I use Prime and previously tried a different type dechlorinator, which worked great for people with harder water and killed fish when people had very low KH.

This is a really thorough article re: water chemistry
https://users.cs.duke.edu/~narten/faq/chemistry.html

 

[Joannajj]

You might just need some magnesium. You can check into adding some dissolved plain, nothing added pharmacy Epsom Salts which is magnesium sulfate, and possibly some calcium powder.

If you can do a GH/KH test and see what you find mainly with the kH it could be very useful.

What kind of dechlorinator are you using? Some types use different methods of binding the chlorine and if you already have low KH and you use a type which uses calcium to bind with it, you can crash your tank. Personally have had that terrible experience. Others use O2. And I am not a chemist so my knowledge is limited and the intricate details of all the ways those things work.

I use Prime and previously tried a different type dechlorinator, which worked great for people with harder water and killed fish when people had very low KH.

This is a really thorough article re: water chemistry
https://users.cs.duke.edu/~narten/faq/chemistry.html

Thanks so much! I’ll get a GH/KH test and try the methods mentioned in the article.