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ttop24
01-18-2021, 01:52 PM
My tap water has at any given season between 20-40 nitrate so I use Ro/Di water.

with that said everything I read says to remineralize the water with tap water about a 80/20 mix. I do not want to add nitrates back to my fish tank.


My tank. I run a 125 Gallon Planted tank with 7 Discus.
Ph 6.4
Nitrate 0
Gh- 5
KH-1 or less (api test kit only goes to 1)
Everything else is 0
50% water change a day to every other day

I am remineralizing with Cichlid Lake Salt to get to a 4GH.
When I run my co2 injection my PH drops to a 6.0. I'm wondering if I should use something else to increase my KH or leave it alone. I was looking at dosing with discus trace to help remineralize. Im not dosing alot of co2 and would like to ramp it up slowely but afraid my ph would drop alot lower.

What are your thoughs / Opinions to help my tank thrive better.

Willie
01-18-2021, 02:02 PM
Discus evolved in an environment that has near zero dissolved minerals in the water. You may chose to do so to manage pH or help your plants thrive, but there's no need to add minerals back from the perspective of the fish.

ttop24
01-18-2021, 02:53 PM
and everything I read says you shouldnt keep them in Straight RO/DI water

Willie
01-18-2021, 03:38 PM
and everything I read says you shouldnt keep them in Straight RO/DI water

That's a lot of misinformation on the Internet, most of it falls in the category of 'repeating old wives tales'. I've had to keep discus in straight R/O for 5 years due to a water main problem, and they grew well, spawned readily and raised a lot of fry during that time. If anyone ran into a problem directly, I've yet to hear of it.