alanmin4304

I remember a mayor being interviewed on TV and claiming his town had a 6 stage treatment system and what he meant was there was a series of 6 pumps taking the sewage to the nearest river.

They will not give it to you like that because you would be screaming down the phone at them when all your taps were dripping and your hot water cylinder was leaking. God gives it to you every time it rains.

There is something wrong with your test kit. If the water from the tap was pH 6 all your taps would be dripping from dezincafication and your hot water cylinder would be leaking like a seive.

I have used hydrochloric because phosphoric is milder but can cause algae problems. I don't us chemicals now, just get fish used to what I have got. Fish will tolerate a reasonable range of pH if it changes slowly. It is more important with some fish if you are trying to breed them.

Welcome

To make the water more acid you need to add hydrogen ions in the form of: Carbonic acid from injecting CO2, tannic acid from adding driftwood or oak leaves or tea bags, or rainwater which is usually contaminated with sulphur dioxide. It will not take a lot to change it to 7.2 but 5.5 is a bit more of an ask. If I remember correctly Coca Cola is about 4.6 and that contains a lot of carbonic acid which is carbon dioxide in solution.

You don't. If you play with it you will be forever chasing it. The only way I know of is to add things like peat that will make it acid but unlikely to get to 5.5 I would have thought. You have to add hydrogen ions to lower the pH and hydroxyl ions to raise it above 7.

pH (small p and Capital H) is minus the log of the hydrogen ion concentration. Put into english that is that 7 is neutral and if you add an acid to neutral water at 7 and one drop takes the pH from 7 to 6 then it will take 10 drops to take it to 5 and 100 drops to take it to 4. An acid is a solution that provides hydrogen ions (hydrogen atoms with an electron missing). Conversally if you add an alkali (a solution that provides hydroxyl ions) to a neutral solution and one drop moves it from 7 to 8 then it will take 10 drops to move it from 8 to 9. Hardness is a measure of the amount of Calcium and magnesium ions in the water. The term hardness relates to the hardness of getting soap to lather in the water and the original measure of hardness was a titration of a known solution of soap and when the water was able to froth the hardness had been used up and the soap woul start to work. Soap is made by boiling caustic soda (sodium hydroxide) with fat and this makes soap (sodiun stearate) and glycerine. The sodium in the soap swaps over with the calcium and forms calcium stearate which is insoluble and becomes the scum on your bath. If you add calcium carbonate (mable chips, chalk etc) it reacts with the hydrogen ions and removes them from the water which becomes less acid. It is not the calcium that does that but the carbonate or bicarboate (which is more soluble than carbonate). There endith the lesson for today.

Ph has nothing to do with hardness which is caused by calcium and magnesium ions.

It would be very unusual to have a reticulated council water supply at that pH because it would corrode away your hot water cylinder and brass fittings in a matter of months

Flourish excel does

It is not cheap.

You could add flourish excel as a carbon source if you are worried about driving off CO2.

Good water movement and surface movement helps to prevent algae problems.

Many years ago, before people here realised they would breed as axies, people were forcing them to morph in order to try and breed them. They have been in the country for a long time and now and again Maf would make noises about banning them. It has been quiet for a while. Newts are newts and salamanders are salamanders. There seems to be at least three strains of Japanese fire bellies here going by the markings. There are many more in Japan.

Most of the aquariums around this part of the world are only partly filled because we get regular tsunamis inside the house. Only joking--better to be sure than sorry.

Most people like them and that is why they are sold. Doesn't keep them alive in a tank though.

Warning cancelled. Man right again. Go have a nice cuppa.

Easiest way is to bring your partner as well.

Hi and welcome. You can meet more fish and turtle lovers at the local fish club meeting on the 16th.

Livebearers unfortunately are subject to many diseases and not only parasites. This is why they are going to become harder to get through quarantine and therefore more difficult to import.

They only supply micronutrients. If you have good CO2, and good light you will need macronutrient as well.

I would have thought that since raising the temperature of aquarium water means it cannot carry as much oxygen then the converse would be true.

We don't have the Ausie ones (rainbow skinks--Lampropholis delicata) in the South Island (we hope)

You can advise people that various plants are not aquatic plants as much as you like but these are often the the plants that people want. Good examples would be peace lillies, spider plant--sold as wheat grass and most of the red plants. Supply and demand. Do your homework first. Another problem of course is that the shops don't know what the plants are either. I don't know how many times I have asked what a plant is and got the answer $3.50 a bunch.