Driftwood can help if you don't mind dark water.
How to drop down the ph?
Driftwood can help if you don't mind dark water.
Well, there's R/O, various buffers and regulators, muriatic acid, peat, ketapang leaves, and driftwood..That's my short list...oh yeah, and also relocating!
The meek shall inherit the earth. The oceans are for the brave.
Maybe you don't need to lower your pH. Why do you want to lower it? I see you don't have many posts, are you a beginner? When I began, I read that low pH was necessary for Discus, but that's not true. Discus will do very well at many different levels of pH. The most important thing is to not change the pH abruptly. A consistent pH with frequent water changes will make your discus very healthy!
soft butter helps too.
Unless you Ph is 8.5 and up and your not breeding or have wilds.
Dont mess with it. One thing I learned from this site is that a stable Ph is the best thing. Dont go throwing chemicals in it to try and lower it.
Discus thrive in lots of water PH conditions. But if the PH is jumping up and down because of chemicals, THAT will kill them.
What if you have a pH of 8.2 and want to do wilds? I've heard that using RO water won't impact the pH all that much, is this true?
-Luke
65gal RR w/ 20 gal sump, 6 Curipera X's from Kenny!
For what it's worth I adjusted my PH because after aging tap it was 8.6.
I use and RO/tap mix and keep my PH consistent at 7.4 when doing water changes. I have two 55 gallon barrels, one to age tap and the other for RO. I have a 42 Brute for mixing.
As an example, for a 40 gallon water change I use 17 gallons of tap and the balance RO. I have the mix of RO/Tap documented and can hold my PH regardless of the size of the water change.
That being said I had to "play around until I found the right mix. You also need to ALWAYS test your tap because things change through your water supplier. Both barrels have a heater and airstone. Before I leave for work in the morning a turn them on and everything is ready when I get home.
I still use prime in my tap at the suggested amounts.
At first nailing down your mix is a lot of testing but is pretty easy once you have it nailed down. And on the recommendation of some of the members here I bought a Hanna TDS/PH tester which made life even easier!
I saw a noticeable difference in my fish once I started the WC regime. Just start out with small WC at first and eventually you tank will cycle over to the lower PH. I did my 125 over the course of 9 days. Yes I was paranoid!
One of the potential problems you can run into….. not having RO to do the mix and having to do a WC. I keep my RO 55 full with aeration.
Last edited by atitagain; 05-18-2011 at 03:28 PM.
Marc
Well, we haven't heard from the original poster. Did we scare him/her off ? ? ?