Originally Posted by
thebaldingaquarist
for old tank syndrome affected tanks, the ecology and balance of the aquarium is skewered towards a small subset of bacterial processes. What i mean to say is in a balanced aquarium, some bacteria produces ammonia and acid, some other bacteria will take the ammonia and convert it to nitrates, some other bacteria takes the acid and makes precipitates out of other metal oxides and stuff. simply put, at the end of the day, the plants takes all of the end product, be it ammonium, nitrites or nitrates and all the rest of the nutrients to grow or respire or photosynthesize.
in an old tank, this balance is thrown off course, be it too much, or too little of certain elements.
the easiest solution is to reset the tank.
the other option is to slowly back track. my recommendation in the above reply is to slowly backtrack.
start by slowly introducing a water column that is balanced and clear of as much dissolved solids as possible. we need to do this slowly as not to affect the fauna and flora that is existing in the tank. that is to say, if you do a 100% water change now, the fauna may end up in shock and not survive.. removal of elements in the water column will do 2 things.
1. recalibrate the substrate and media slowly by drawing out elements that throwing off the balanced set of bacterial processes
2. slowly adjusting the fauna and flora back to ideal state
then once the water state is stable, replace/clean parts of the aquarium that contain the bacterial processes in the tank. remember, to do it in parts for the same reason above. in an aquarium there are 3 places that contain bacteria colonies large enough to influence the water quality.
1. substrate / gravel
2. filter media
3. all other tank surfaces.
I recommended to start with the media. if it does not help, then its time to reset the substrate. number 3 is normally way smaller in ratio compared to the first 2.
Why did i recommend to remove the chips? its because of the principle above, i am aiming to remove as much elements from the water as possible, slowly. if the flora is surviving in the tank with high nitrates and low PH, adding chips now will help buffer the PH from flying up and down, in that aspect i agree with what bro sthh mentioned.
the keyword here is slowly. all the above have to be done in increments and slowly, which requires mountains of patience.
last note.. hornworts take in both CO2 and carbonates as its carbon source (iirc). so having large amounts of hornworts might just absorb the carbonates meant to increase the KH.
and also, take my recommendation above with a pinch of salt. its a slow process. one that requires work every day.
Of course, the best course of action if its me, is to treat my wife to a nice dinner and tell her i need to reset the tank.
PS. i typed this response 3 times. first 2 times, the browser hung. so this third time i skipped alot of details.
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