Newbie here... Need help...

[lostboy]

I need advise from all the seniors here. I'm new in doing plant tank and I'm facing some problems and I hope that someone can advise me with it.

1) pH problem: The pH of the water has remained high (>pH7.6) despite of increasing the CO2 supply & adding pH-. Chan(NA) has advised me to check the tap water pH & indeed it's >7.6... Can anyone give me advise to step down the pH??

2) Water hardness: I have measured the parameters of my water, kH= 4dKH, GH=>12dGH, nH3=0mg/L... What's the ideal GH for plant tank? Any advise on how to step down the GH?

3) My fishes(Oto, puffer) & shrimps(Yamoto) have started to die day by day... Is it due to the harsh water condition? I have even add in water conditioner like black water & Geo liquid but problem still not solve...

4) I read from some threads on maturing the water... How do i determine whether the water is matured? Can anyone advise me on 'how to mature the water'??? One of my friends has advised me to put in some 'longkang fishes' to stablise the eco-system... Is that true?

FYI, mine is a -1mth 3 footer...

[budak]

Your pH. Are you using a substrate or filter medium with shell/coral/calcium carbonate elements? If so, this has to be changed. Otherwise, you are probably unfortunate to live in a high pH water mains area.

In planted tanks, kh is the main concern. I think your parameters are fine.

What's your plant/fish population? Water temperature? Water changes? Filtration? Maturing usually means that the tank has sufficient nitrifying bacteria to convert the fish waste into ammonium, and that the plants are settled well enough to act as biological filters. YOu might have added too many fishes too early, but strange that your NH3 is nil.

Apart from controlling your CO2 input carefully to get pH down to 7, try adding some fast-growing plants or floating plants to act as nutrient sponges in the meantime.

[Simon]

1) pH problem: The pH of the water has remained high (>pH7.6) despite of increasing the CO2 supply & adding pH-. Chan(NA) has advised me to check the tap water pH & indeed it's >7.6... Can anyone give me advise to step down the pH??
hmmmmm... I have a solution but may not be practised, lower yr KH down...
see what the rest have to say first, coz I never tried it before. One reason why yr PH did changed, could be dosing less than required amounts of the solution

2) Water hardness: I have measured the parameters of my water, kH= 4dKH, GH=>12dGH, nH3=0mg/L... What's the ideal GH for plant tank? Any advise on how to step down the GH?

3) My fishes(Oto, puffer) & shrimps(Yamoto) have started to die day by day... Is it due to the harsh water condition? I have even add in water conditioner like black water & Geo liquid but problem still not solve...
perharps yr tank hasnt finished the cycling process, or u didnt aclimatize yr shrimps properly.. adding of chemicals aint the best way and plus u add more than one which may do more harm than good

4) I read from some threads on maturing the water... How do i determine whether the water is matured? Can anyone advise me on 'how to mature the water'??? One of my friends has advised me to put in some 'longkang fishes' to stablise the eco-system... Is that true?
u mean aged water? or matured water from a matured tank? for aged/overnight water, just leave a pail of water overnight or 2 nights for the chlorine to dissolve into the atmosphere. did u have any algae eater in there b4 u add the puffer/yamato?

[Allen_1971]

Hey lostboy,

Don't worry, we people here love to try and solve problems... worst case simon will do a house call (must pay consultation fee - joking)

OK more seriously, I began typing a reply to you which I have since deleted... reason being that I lack too much info to make educated guesses at whats happening... So I'll reply you with a series of questions, and that should help both me and others here help you.

1. Your tank is 3ft in length? whats the height and width?
2. What sort of gravel did you use for your tank?
3. Did you add a fertilizer substrate?
4. How soon after putting in the gravel did you introduce plants? are your plants growing well?
5. How soon after putting in the gravel did you introduce fishes? how many did you put in?
5a. How soon after introducing fishes did they start dying?
6. Have you been fiddling around a lot in your tank?
7. What sort of filter are you using? the brand and model would be helpful.
8. What sort of lights are you using and how many watts?
9. Are you injecting CO2? If so, whats your bubble rate?
10. Can you check the KH of your tap water?
11. Do you understand what is meant by the Nitrogen cycle?
12. What have you been dosing your water with besides blackwater extract and geo-liquid?
13. Is your water cloudy?
14. Are you feeding your fishes? If so, do they consume ALL the food? and how long do they take to do so?

Thats all I can think of for now.

[PeterGwee]

Allen..bombardment of questions!!!! ..Yah..we need the answers though to help you..
Ok..one thing to ask...what brand of test kits are you using? Hopefully its not those 5 in 1 type as they are not that accurate as compared to specific types...(It is really hard to imagine the pH not dropping even after CO2 injection..I had KH increasing last time due to probably some unknown presence of coral chips in my substrate but that did not stop the pH from dropping when CO2 is injected though...best is you check your test kit)

[hoppinghippo]

lostboy: if you're starting your tank from scratch with new filter material, new substrate, new everything, your cycling may take quite a while due to the size of your tank. at this pt in time, don't worry too much about all the jazz and bish bash and cha pa lang levels of nh3, kh, PIE, AYE, KJE, ERP.. etc. first and foremost, worry about why your fishes are dying, this is nothing to do with your kh, ph, unless the kh and ph are extreme which in your case aren't. I think prob your tank isn't cycled and nitrite levels or watever are too high for fish to tahan. stop co2 bubbling, it won't help your fish, put airstone or something to aerate water.

basically, the typical learner's route is to have about 2-3 batches of fishes dying before the next batch survives and you know your tank's ok!! heh.... but notwithstanding that, the easiest way to speed up your tank's cycling is to get used filter material from someone's filter, and to get hardy fishes which don't need very good quality water. idea is to have a bacteria colony to start from and to have ammonium compounds for bacteria to break down to nitrites and nitrates (and in the process the bacteria grows in number). some hobbyist use ammonium chemicals to add in without any fishes present to artificially speed it up.

basically, if your tank and filter is brand new, you have to be very very patient, just try to enjoy your plants first!