Originally Posted by
lpsouth1978
So far the pH is staying stable at about 6.5. I had to use some aragonite in a media bag to get it stable, so the GH and KH are a bit higher, but still in acceptable range. I have found that by mixing RO/DI with tap water at a 1:1 ratio and adding some of my homemade blackwater extract to the aged water, I can match the 6.5 pH.
Now if only the cycle would complete. The ammonia dropped almost 2 weeks ago. I add ammonia every other to 2ppm and it is processed in less than 24 hours. Unfortunately the nitrites are still somewhere between 2-5ppm, hard to tell exactly. I am hoping that the nitrites drop soon. it has been 5 weeks since getting the tank wet.
On another note, I am not sure that I will still be putting Discus in this system. The more time I spend thinking, reading, and planning, the less confident I feel about my plan. Keeping my first blackwater system will already be a challenge, but making my first blackwater system my FIRST Discus system, seems like too high a risk. I don't feel that I would be able to maintain it to standards that discuss demand. It seems it would be nearly impossible to remove all the waste and detritus with the leaf litter and other botanicals in the system. For this reason I have decided to forego the Discus in this system. Instead, I will be doing a more forgiving community blackwater system with Angel's, tetras, German Blue Rams, and corydoras. I will still update my progress here until (if ever) there seems to be no interest in the tank from others in this community.