PH in the hot tap water

[mktorn]

Hi everyone,
I open that thread to share an issue which almost cause my discus badly hurt or even dead.
I usually use only cold water for my W/C. I age water for 24h and heat it in a bottle. Day before yesterday I decided to try mix cold water and hot water from the tap, because cold water flow was really slow. Then yesterday I started a W/C in my son’s small tank (thanks God not in the discus one). So I replaced 50% and almost immediately fish went up to the surface and upside-down catfish even like paralyzed and hardly breathing. In panic I replaced about 70% of water by old water remaining in bucket and water from the discus tank. Fish survived. I started to look for a reason of that trouble. What I found out was a deadly high PH in aged water ~9.0ppm. I tested tap water and get cold PH=7.5 hot>8.8!
So I blame a hot water deadly high PH in almost kill my fish.
I guess the lesson is that we should avoid to use hot tap water in W/C.
Thanks for your attention,
Michael

[DiscusOnly]

I wouldn't say avoid it but you do need to be careful if you do mix. I've been using straight tap water from my faucet with hot water mix for almost a year now and no problem for me. My water changes on the 3 tanks is 40-50%.

[Graham]

Hi, I think that if you had an O2 test kit you would have found that there was very little, if any usable O2 in the hot water. Also the test kit probably didn't read properly with the hot water...extreme temps either way messes them up.

The fish went to the surface because that's where the most O2 would have been.

Since you only changed 50% and that was with a mix of hot and cold the pH bounce wouldn't have been all that great and even then, the effects on the fish wouldn't have shown up instantly.

Fish experiencing Alkalosis will have excess mucus sloughing off, possible frayed fins, be very excitable.........not rolling over.

I've always used and continue to use, a mix of hot and cold water for water changes on the Africans and the Koi, but it's blasted in for O2 reasons

G

[mktorn]

Hi Graham,
I didn't test O2. But the water was aged for 24hours, not fresh mix. The fact is a huge PH and difference with hot water and water in the tank was almost 1.5ppm which is still very bad.
I think it may be a case of bad water in my building since I am living in apartment.

Thank you for your comments,
Michael

[Graham]

Ok I mis-read it, ...but the increase in pH of 1.5 would not have done a thing to the fish in the instant that the water went into the tank.

Fish are quite capable of handling going up in pH especially with such a small rise as 1.5. Drops of 3 or more points would be another story.

This wasn't a pH issue

BTW pH is not measured in ppm, it's a logarithmic scale measuring hydrogen ions with each number being a factor of 10 of the numbers around it.

[troyclark]

I have always used the hot and cold water and never had a problem.

[mikel]

It's not the ph in the "hot" water. I have used mixed hot/cold from the tap with absolutely no problem. I did buy a new hot water tank 2 years ago...but the ph is the same whether from just cold or hot/cold mixed....so something else hurt your fish, not the hot water. I used to age cold water and heat with a heater...but realized that i was just making more work for myself. mike

[2sybs]

Could this be a chlorine issue?
You didn't say if you treated the tap water with anything and at the same time would not have been an issue with the aged water.
I use mixed tap water as well to do 50-60% changes every other day and use Prime while I am adding it.
Ray

[GulfCoastDiscus]

I don't think this is a Ph issue. My guess is chlorine.

[MSD]

I mix my tap water for the purpose of correct temperature and have no PH issues. I have tested before and after and at the source and its 8.2 from the taps, hot and cold. I let the hot water run with the cold when I syphon the tank with the Python, in case any debris may have settled in the tank, never have I seen any. My water company uses an alkaline buffer to prevent the copper pipes from getting damaged, on Long Island we have soft water from aquifers and my water district does not chlorinate. I use a little Discus Buffer with each daily change and my PH stays at 6.7 +/- 0.1.

[AADiscus]

We mix hot and cold together also. Especially right now it is more hot water because the cold water is very cold due to it being winter. We do treat our water though. Never had any problems.

[Apistomaster]

I mix hot and cold and have done so for well over four decades. Your problem was caused by something else.