pH for planted aquaria with wood

[Mystikboy]

For planted tanks with wood, I understand that the wood can cause the ph to plummet. Will pre soaking the wood for a few weeks really eliminate this problem?


My tank has a pH of 6.0. Is that ok or too low for plants? And if so, how should I raise it, long term? I think short term solutions like baking soda are not very effective.

My tank is as follows:
I seriously over filter my tank, with a 2228 filtering 60 x 30 x 20

I use Borneo wild lush and growth (equivalent to excel). 2 pumps of lush and one pump of growth daily.



2ft led lights.



Tank is stocked with 9 rummies, about 10 cories and 2 l183.



Plants are java ferns, anubias, and moss. The plants don't seem to be doing too great (stagnant growth) but the java ferns is the worst.

Sand substrate with 3 pieces of wood


Thank you!

[Urban Aquaria]

Pre-soaking and boiling of wood (and changing the tannin stained water regularly) will help to remove most of their tannins which lower pH, but generally most wood will still continue releasing tannins even after being pre-soaked, just at a lower rate, hence there will still be some pH reducing effect over time.

pH of 6.0 is okay for plants, the lower pH is mostly likely from the combination of wood pieces and the bacteria activity from processing the bio-load waste. Your fishes will be fine in that pH too.

For sand substrate tanks, you may need to adjust the fert dosing abit more (but not too much until algae take over) as there is no active soil substrate to gradually release nutrients. Your plants could also just be adapting to the new tank conditions so it might take some time for them to transition, since they are mostly slow growing plants anyways.