Kh and growth

[Sivasama]

Will a off the charts kh cause my fish problems with growth? I had around 280ppm kh. 7 of my fish didn't have very good growth. Just wondering about it?

[Frankr409]

Will a off the charts kh cause my fish problems with growth? I had around 280ppm kh. 7 of my fish didn't have very good growth. Just wondering about it?

Just curious, which test kit did you use for this reading. I use a Tetra kit for example, my Kh is 7 dH (7 * 17.9 = 125 ppm)

280/17.9 is roughly 12.5. Not low, but not the worst I think.

There can be a variety of reason why fish stunt, feeding, etc. Do you have other concerns?

[Sivasama]

It is an Aquarium Pharmaceuticals or API test kit. It took 15 drops and the chart only goes to 12. Chart showed 1 drop 17.9 so I figured around 280

[kaceyo]

That's not going to be a problem. Your fish should do fine in it.

[Sivasama]

Hmmmm, I thought hard water would effect growth. Maybe I'm looking at the wrong thing? Do to this I had 8+ ph for a year before I started using ro water. Now kh is low and ph runs 7 to 7.4. I noticed a change in color of the fish when I got the ph and kh down. Maybe it was more the high ph causing stress on the fish?

[kaceyo]

KH doesn't measure hardness. It measures carbonate hardness, which is different.
Hard water (high GH, TDS, etc) will usually improve growth rate.

[Eddie]

KH doesn't measure hardness. It measures carbonate hardness, which is different.
Hard water (high GH, TDS, etc) will usually improve growth rate.


Ditto

[Sivasama]

Main problem is the kh and my ph are high. I can't get the ph down in my tap with the high kh. I don't have a wide range ph kit or a meter but it takes a 10 to 1 ro to tap ratio to get my ph at a rock steady 7.2. I understand what kh is now. I just wish my tap was easier to work with. I have to get a tds tester to see what that's like with so little tap.

[Jhhnn]

In my limited experience, the most important factor wrt growth is... food, lots of it, lots of variety in it, including beefheart.

Growing discus need what most aquarists would consider to be ridiculous amounts of food for proper growth. I feed at least 3 times/day, enough so that it takes the fish 20 minutes or so to clean it up, and they're showing fat bellies afterwards. If small amounts remain behind for awhile, it's not a big deal because-

It seems to me that large partial daily water changes are necessary, unless you're employing extremely high tech methods w/ live plants as well. Chad Hughes gets excellent results that way, but he still changes a lot of water.

KH an pH are secondary concerns. George Garcia raises discus in extremely hard Arizona water w/ high pH quite handily. Anything that makes water changing more difficult and more time consuming is best avoided when possible...

Everybody's circumstances are different, but I think that investing up front in the means to make water changing quick and easy pays off, and is one of the most important things any discus keeper can do...