Hi,
Think I read somewhere that the KH of tap water in Singapore is close to zero. Tested my tank water's KH and it was too low (meaning less than 1dKH) to be tested with a commercial test kit.
May I know what is the optimal KH level for a planted tank? Or does it not matter at all? Or do I have to test my pH at different times of the day to see if the fluctuations are severe or not before I touch on KH?
Typically 2 to 4 dkH, it is to prevent pH swing. However, if you use ADA aquasoil (not sure about Gex) your kH will stay low even if you put baking soda in (will drop to zero again after a while). Good news is ADA have the pH buffering capability to prevent ph swing.
Correct me if i am wrong, i used to place a handful of corals chips into my external filter to keep the KH constant.
yes you are correct, corals chip will increase the kH. Question is why do you want to do that unless your fauna require it. Unless you see something wrong with your fauna, best leave it as it is. That is my rule of tumb and so far so good
So does that mean it is all right to leave the KH at almost zero? My philosophy is also to leave things as it is if things are fine. Especially on water chemistry... But tank has been stable for a while, hand itchy wanted to see if I can improve anything and learn. Haha...
What substrate did you use? ADA soils or Gex or others
I wonder if planted tanks in themselves regulate ph to fair degree.
I'm running a moderately-heavily planted tank with Gex soil, C02 on timer solenoid to run when lights are on 12hrs a day. Ph is about 6.0 throughout the day according to my ph meter. I raised my kh to 2 with sodium bicarb but it brought on a big growth of ?green brush algae that took forever to disappear....tank seems better off with a low kh.
I am using Gex soil mainly, most bottom is a thin layer of peat moss with fine bamboo charcoal and lava chips.
Thanks properfool for sharing your experience. Think my set up quite similar to yours. Can anyone enlighten why raising the KH would result in green brush algae in such a setup?
Algae is more complex than that, otherwise no one screeming about algae. You need to asked your self whether you dose enough fertilizer, CO2 level, Water flow and light wattage.
quite simply dumping in bicarb changes the chemical equilibrium. some websites say the brush algae thrives when given a source of bicarbonate.
Probably could have dealt with the algae by adjusting the fert regime some way, but now that I don't use bicarb my plants seem ok and the fish are happy, so decided to forget about using bicarb for now....
Yah that is what I do not understand. How does adding bicarbonate changes in such a way to encourage brush algae? As in, what chemical equilibrium does it disturb?
check out below link, interesting info on brush algae
http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Algae/red-algae.html
go to the "consider CO2" section and it is mention that brush algae prefered low pH
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