PH swings in planted tank and general disus questions.

[rogge26]

The PH of my relatively heavily planted 50 gallon tank is 6.1 to 6.2 at night and then slowly rises to 6.5-6.7 during the day. Is this too much of a change? Or is this ok? I am currently using Kent RO right to supplement my RO water. According to the label, my water should be medium hardness at about 100 ppm despite what tests may say. When I did test my water with Mardel test strips, the strips said my GH was around 50 ppm. Would the test strips be right or should I go by the directions on the container of Kent R/O right? I am shooting for a GH of 100 parts ppm or 6 degrees of general hardness as I have read that medium hardness is best for growing out juvenile discus. I have four 3 inch to 3.5 inch disus. I am also probably going to switch to Seachem Equilibrium as I heard that this is a much better product for plants and for fish in general. I am also hoping that this product will add more buffering capacity. I am going to follow the directions on the prpduct to achieve 6 degrees of general hardness. How should I go about switching my fish to this new product? Should I do it gradually or does it matter since I am shooting for the same general hardness with a different product? Is 100 ppm. or 6 degrees of gh a good amount of hardness to grow out juvenile discus?
Also, I am currently feeding my fish three times a day, as that is all I have time for as I work full time and am also a full time student. I feed them once in the morning, once 9 hours later when I get home from work and once three hours later, a couple of hours before the lights go off at night. They are fed Hikari frozen blood worms in the morning, switch off between Omega One Veggie and Omega One first flake in the afternoon and the Omega One Super Color Flake in the evening. Is this diet varied enough for the Discus? Are my discus getting good enough nutrition? Are they getting fed enough or should I invest in an automatic fish feeder?
Sorry for the long post. I guesse I had more questions than I thought. Thanks in advance for all the advice.

[aquagal]

Your pH swing is fine. Plants release CO2 at night, which will cause your pH to drop slightly.

I feed my juvenilles 4-6 times per day and they are growing well. I feed frozen blood worms/brine shrimp/mysis shrimp twice per day and then supplement these feedings w/ Omega One flake and some pellets (they really don't like the pellets). If your schedule is busy, I would invest in an autofeeder, they work great.

Regarding your water, it appears you are using 100% RO and then adding supplements? If your tap water is not extreme, why don't you just use it? It would be a lot easier and the fish don't care, as long as you are consistent w/ your water change schedule. I age/aerate/heat my water for at least 24 hours before changes. Many people on this forum raise juvenilles successfully in pH ranges from 6.0 to 8.0 and varying degrees of hardness. I believe the only time you need to be worried about the hardness of the water is if you want to breed. Softer water is required for successful hatch rates.

Good luck.
Sherry

[rogge26]

Thanks for the advice. I am very happy to hear thay my ph swings are normal for a planted tank. I was a little worried.
I have an Eheim auto feeder for when I go on vacation. It is not set up yet and I have never used it. I will set it up though and set it to feed my discus once per day and I will feed them the other three times a day. I like the fact that they recognize me as the one that feeds them and that they swim to the front of the tank when I walk in the room. I don't want to lose that. I will also try to incorporate some brine shrimp into one of my feedings. I can not get live brine shrimp in my area. Do you know of any good frozen brine shrimp?
I already have the RO unit so why not use it? Theie water in the wild is soft so it would stand to reason that they would be happier in softer water. Is there an advantage to using tap water over RO water with minerals added besides the cost? I will continue to use the RO unit, but if the Seachem Equilibrium is not satisfactory, I will try mixing in tap water with my RO water. Genereal consensus seems to be 75% RO water to 25% tap water. Does that sound right?
Thanks again for the excellent advice. The advice was very helpful.

[aquagal]

I use Hikari frozen foods. They make a spirulina brine shrimp that my fish go nuts for (I think they even like it more than blood worms). I just recently bought 15 cube packages from drsfosterandsmith.com. They charge $20 to ship, but if you buy enough the price is still quite a bit cheaper than your LFS AND it comes right to your door. I got my shipment in less than 24 hours. Hikari also has just released a frozen food just for discus (it contains brine shrimp and cod I think). My fish like this also.

As far as the RO goes, I just don't want to bother with the chemicals (acid). I mix 50% RO and 50% tap. I'm even growing tired of this and have been assured by others my tap is fine. I'll probably move towards 100% tap gradually and reserve the RO if I do decide to breed. However, my 9month old fish has already started to lay eggs, so she must like the water? The ultimate mix depends on your water. My water from the tap has a TDS of about 160-180 and a pH of about 7.6-7.8. When I do a 50/50 mix I get a TDS around 100 and a pH around 7.3.

[rogge26]

Thanks for the advice. I will check out Drs. Foster and Smith and get some of their frozen foods.
My tap water is radically different than my RO water with minerals added. How would I go about changing over to a 75/25 or 50/50 mix? My fish are happy and healthy. I do not want to screw that up by messing with the water too much.

[aquagal]

just do it gradually...they will adapt fine. I assume you don't have crazy water parameters (super hard or super soft, etc.). Mine is medium hard, so all I'm doing is softening it up a bit, and I don't have to worry about adding anything...

If you don't mind using 100% RO and remineralizing, stick with it if it works for you. I'm just not thrilled w/ the extra hassle and the large amount of water wasted using the RO units (ALOT of water is discharged as wastewater).