Tigger Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 Hello, Haven't been on for a while as everything had been running nice and smoothly but something is definitely up with our tank. The pH has gone haywire, its always been 7.5-7 but recently dropped to 6, I've been doing a 25% water change every other day and today when I tested the water the pH has dropped to 5! I have no idea what could have caused this. We do appear to have lost a couple of fish over the last month and no bodies have been found but the amonia and nitrite levels have stayed at 0 so I'm not sure if it is that or not. Can anyone help In the meantime I am off to do another water change Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jim r Posted October 8, 2008 Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 How long has the tank been running?What fish do you have?What else do you have in the tank?What size tank?What manner are your water changes?PH from tap? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 8, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 8, 2008 The tank has been up and running for almost a year now and the pH has always been steady until recently. We have 6 neon tetras, 1 dawrf gourami, 3 dwarf chain loaches, 2 zebra danios and 5 neon dwarf rainbows. No wood or anything in the tank to cause any problems, decoration takes the form of some terracota pots. Water changes are done through syphon to help keep gravel clean as well, not sure of pH from the tap to be honest but unless the council has made some serious changes to the water in Hamilton recently would this really have such a big effect? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 10, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 Can anyone offer any suggestions, done another test today and now at 5.5 so slightly better but still not good. The other two tanks are fine so really think it has to be something going on in this particular tank. :-? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmsmith Posted October 10, 2008 Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 What sort of filter are you running? How big is the tank? I've found that if you leave your filter material for a while with a high stocked tank, the acids from the fish tend to build up and lower the pH. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 10, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 The tank is a 60l one, I'm not sure of the filter, its one of the ones that hang of the back with the inlet in the tank, we are pretty good with our filter maintainance though, cleaning one half one month and then leaving it for a month or so before cleaning the other half so we don't wipe out all the bacteria in one go. I know we aren't perfect with our regime but it has worked up till now and we haven't changed anything we do to suddenly cause a change and prior to the last week the pH has always been 7-7.5. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr pleco Posted October 10, 2008 Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 do you run carbon in yr filter system? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 10, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 yup always have Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr pleco Posted October 10, 2008 Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 carbon has to be replaced depending on usage every 4-6 months ) otherwise it will build up nitrogens and dump excess back into the water crashing yr ph this may explain yr problem remove all carbon clean yr filter out in water from the tank give it big 50% water change and see what happens ..although carbon is great for keeping the water clean most fish keepers dont use it unless they replace it regularly or only if they want to remove chemicals after dosing for a disease or such hth mr pleco p.s cleaning it dosent mean the same as replacing it ,its a disposable item kinda like a cigarrette you cant smoke it twice Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jim r Posted October 10, 2008 Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 Does Hamilton draw water from lake Taupo? We here have had some messing around by the TDC (water) and also KH here is 0-2 which can contribute to Ph swings. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yeh_buddy Posted October 10, 2008 Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 Have you tested the Ph from the tap water? To raise the Ph in your tank you could add some coral chips or dolomite, but I dont know how easy they would be to find, if at all. Hope that helps. Good luck :bounce: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 10, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 10, 2008 We haven't tested it recently, I'll do that tomorrow when we get back from the rugby just to make sure its not gone funny. Mind you we have two other tanks and the pH in them are fine so it makes me thik it is something in the tank rather than the water we are putting in. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 13, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 13, 2008 we tested the tap water last night and came out at a pH of 7. The tank water dopes slowly seem to be going back to normal, now at 5.75 thanks to every other day water changes, fingers crossed it keeps heading in the right direction. Still have no idea what could have caused the drop though which is a pain as then I don't know what to do to stop it happening again :-? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simian Posted October 13, 2008 Report Share Posted October 13, 2008 You could try buffering the water by adding a couple of shells, it will increase the hardness a little but shouldnt raise the PH too high unless you throw in a couple of handfulls. :roll: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tigger Posted October 14, 2008 Author Report Share Posted October 14, 2008 umm might try that, I have a few shells around with nothing to do as I like picking them up at the beach (much to my husbands amusement!), I guess it will give the fish something interesting to look at as well! :lol: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keriboi Posted October 14, 2008 Report Share Posted October 14, 2008 ive had a similar problem water changing weekly with ph at 6.6 tests twice a week all good but last test water was at 6.0 , nothing had changed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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