Anyone using ADA Amazonia II?

[freshfish]

I took out the coral chips at 11pm last night. Tested 3 hours later. This was the colour tested at 2am, 27 Dec:
pH about 6.5

Left tank without coral chips overnight. Also without wood+subwarsetang+fern. Tested again this morning at 8.30am, 27 Dec:
pH about 4.5 (at least orangy now, yesterday was red!)

wood's not the culprit.
How? How? How? help..............
Keep buffering with coral chips? Do you all need to do that, those using this soil?

you can add soda bicarbonate , but it will cause the PH to spike very fast , if you have fauna , not advisable ... you can add in a bit by a bit , not all at once ...
to try and increase the PH ...

[beetroot]

Thanks blue33 and freshfish.

Wah... think for me, it will be a super long cycling process, hehe. Patience... patience....

Will keep monitoring pH and do water changes. Some plants cannot be removed because stuck to the soil . And brown algae already growing on the tank glass and some plants .

I know soda bicarbonate and coral chips will increase pH, that's why i bought the coral chips... do not have soda bicarbonate, and don't wish to have pH spike.

On Xmas eve, when the pH was OK after I buffer with coral chips, i put in 3 shrimps to test. Initially thought they had gone "kaput" but surprisingly they are still surviving. I think that's because the coral chips helped.

Have removed the coral chips for now, will keep monitoring.
(Umm.... anyone can lend me digital pH tester.... kekekeke ...)

[mozaqua]

What brand of test kit are you using and are you checking the low end or high end? You should check both, it is possible for the dual test kits to show the wrong PH. I don't think it could be that low if you had the coral in there, the calcium would fiz like an alkaseltzer tablet.

Oh, and Sodium Bicarbonate, will not ever cause a spike. The effect is immediate, not residual. But don't add anything until you test accurately. I think tetra makes a good Ph test.

[beetroot]

Using Tropical brand. Any good?
When pH was that low, tank had been without coral chips overnight.

Still buffering with coral chips now. At least pH looks better now without coral chips overnight... around 5.5 to 6. But still pretty low....

[mozaqua]

Coral will raise the PH.

Never used that brand before, see if you can borrow another PH test kit from a friend or get yourself a tetra PH test. The one by tetra is not too expensive, and it is quite accurate. Also the blue chemical is easier to read, since you can see the color after the first drop. The color only gets deeper with more drops.

I have used the Red Sea brand, but don't like it. Very difficult to read, a waste of money really. For the dollar I say go with Tetra brand. Some people say lamotte is the best, but why pay the extra $ when its not necessary to be super accurate. Most fish can live in PH from 6-8 no problems, few need more extreme PH.


Also, have you checked the PH of your tap water? Make sure to wash your beaker very well between test, and never spill the excess back into your tank it will kill your fish.
Once you know the PH of your tap water, you should be able to get your tank to the same PH in a few water changes. Soil substrates can have a residual effect on lowering the PH, but the initial effect is the strongest.
In my 20L shrimp tank, I used the ADA amozonia II and I have notice a slight drop in PH now 7.1. My tap water is very hard with a PH of 7.5-7.6, so lower PH is good for my purposes.
If your tap is soft and acidic, you should use a non-soil based substrate like river sand, or latherite.
It might be advisable to get a GH test kit as well, then you will know if you have hard water or soft. Soft water has few buffering minerals like calcium, which means if there is CO2 present in the water the PH can drop very fast!

Before you go out to buy a bunch of test kits, just change 30-50% of your water with aged dechlorinated tap water, to stay on the safe side.

Let me know how it goes, I'll see if I can be any help.

Regards,

[beetroot]

Thanks cobalt99.

Tested my tap water here, pH about 7. Your tap water pH is on the high side, i guess Amazonia II is more suitable for you. But there are other people here in Singapore that used this soil and didn't get pH as low as mine when started.

Umm... currently dont have a digital pH test kit [anyone, anyone can lend ]. When I finish my current test liquid, will go get another brand .

Bit late to change my substrate now, have started... end of week 4 now, but seems pretty ok now as I'm buffering with coral chips. I'll keep monitoring. Doing about 30% water change every two days, and will measure pH with and without coral chips till i find the "right" balance.
Many thanks!

[mozaqua]

Add some dolomite to your filter, that should help raise the mineral content of you water. I think it makes less algae than coral chips. Also I see some other SG guys doing that as well.
Yes, I have the opposite problem with my tap water, I have to filter through a 5gal bucket of peat just to drop the PH below 7!

Let me know how the dolomite works, I used it in my cichlid tank and the PH went from 7.5 to 8.0. I figure if your water is very soft to begin with, this will help buffer it.
Worst case, you add some substrate over top of the soil to prevent the acid from leaching quickly into the water.
Also Sodium Bicarbonate, and Epsom salt can be used. An overdose of epsom might cause algae, but it is pretty safe with fish (not tried with shrimp yet).

Regards,

[pentagon]

do you happen to know where to get peat moss?
just put it in the filter?

peat moss is not really moss ... its used to lower the PH

[beetroot]

I still cannot live without the coral chips. pH still quite unstable without them and it is definitely helping a lot to buffer. Did 40% water change again just now.

Dolomite eh? Is it something like the limescale I saw in UK water? Creates a white layer in the kettle, haha! Not sure if I'll get it because my tank's not big.

For Sodium Bicarbonate, once put in, how long would it last? I mean stabilising the pH. May resort to trying it too. I did try aquarium salt at the initial stage, but I heard it won't do good for the plants. Now I don't think I can put salt as I have nerite snail in there helping to clean algae.

[beetroot]

do you happen to know where to get peat moss?
just put it in the filter?

You're trying to lower the pH further?

[AquaObsession]

spoilt test kit!

anyway, does it really matter... tried planting inside?? or put live fauna inside?? how are they reacting???

Cheers, Christophe

[beetroot]

spoilt? hehe... cannot be leh..
doesn't really matter? am afraid my shrimps will die...

planted some easy plants. ok . they only started growing in week 3.

for fauna - (i) shrimps seem to be ok but if i'd lost a few i don't really know because of the plants/moss. but (ii) two out of four sparkling gourami died . the shrimps are really scavenger, only saw a skeleton of small fish head & back bone left of 1 of the sparkling gourami when i got home.

[mozaqua]

I have heard of really fast growing plants having the effect of lowing the PH. This can happen if your water is very soft to begin with. The plants will take out nutrients from the water causing the water to loose its buffering capacity. After the water has lost its buffering capacity, the Ph will drop from acids present and CO2.

Are you using any resin in your filter? Resins can also take out buffering minerals like calcium and phosphate.
You can also add a spoonful of magnesium sulfate (Epsom salt), this will effectively raise the Ph.
Also Sodium bicarbonate is very safe, just add a small amount to a liter of tap water. Then check the Ph reading, once you know how much to add to raise the Ph by 0.2 points in the one liter. Adjust the amount to raise your tank by .2 every other day until a safe Ph is achieved.
The problem with this is: Ph is not the biggest issue here, water hardness is.
Even if your Ph is at a good level, your water many have no calcium in it, which is very important to shrimp!
You can take some egg shells, boil them in water, then dry them and crush them into small pieces. Toss them in the tank, or filter.
Also make sure to fertilize your plants on a regular basis to keep them from stealing too many minerals from the water. Some root tablets might be appropriate as well.

[qngwn]

have u tried changing the water? like keep changing it tilll re becomes around ph 5.5 to ph 6

[beetroot]

Thank you, cobalt99.

My tank pH is pretty alright now, I think. I am relying less on the coral chips now, although once in a while, may soak them in the tank for a little while. Noted on the calcium. Coral chips provide calcium, right? So sometimes I will soak the coral chips outside and there will be bits of white powder stuff left behind by the chips in the water, then I will pour a little of this water with the white bits into the tank. Learnt something about kH and about using egg shells too from your posts, thanks. Oh, no resin in filter .

qngwn -- yes, have been changing water quite a number of times since starting the tank, and past two weeks, been changing about 30% every 2-3 days.

[qngwn]

haha keep on changing. hopefully it will be well (:

[Loopy]

A lot of good advice. I would get a second opinion. In this case do you have anyone that has a digital PH tester or at the very least another PH kit. Also just in case, test the PH of the water coming out of your tap. (Highly unlikely anything wrong)

I use AMZ II as well but my problem was traced to my tap water. Also, check your KH.

Put those coral chips into another body of water and see what happens. At this point, I would not trust anything and test everything that comes into contact with the water.

So to summarise:
1.) Get another PH Tester
2.) Check your tap PH
3.) Check your KH - I have mine at 4~5
4.) Create another body of water in a cup or something and test it with a bunch of chips

Good luck in finding the culprit. I had a wildly fluctuating PH issue as well. This could be a water hardness issue.

[beetroot]

Still couldn't find anyone that could lend me a digital pH tester. Haha.
Yeah, have tested what you mentioned before. Tested tap water pH about 7.
Also did test coral chips in another body of water, which turned alkaline, so this confirmed that my tester was working.
Didn't test kH though... oops.

Anyway, an update - tank pH doesn't fluctuate that bad anymore. I am still testing the pH every morning and evening. But the pH does drop slightly after about 2 days without coral chips' buffering. That's when I will pour into the tank some water which I have coral chips soaking in (as in my last post on 11th Jan). I hope this helps the kH too.
Do not dare imagine what will happen without daily pH testing or coral chips buffering for a whole week . Don't dare to leave it as such yet....
Shrimps, fish & snails so far are doing fine and eating happily.

Thanks for inputs and advice.

[Fingerling]

Could it be you didnt soak your wood long enough. Some wood pieces take about months to cure of most of their tannins. Try daily water changes of small amounts and see how it picks up from there.



Cheers,
Kenny

[EddyTing]

I'm having the same problem too. Got a shock when i have a PH reading of 5.5. But not too worried about it. I'm just doing frequent water changes now. Hope to get it done within a month or 2.