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how can i lower my alkalinity? I can not get my pH to change, and I think my alkalinity is the problem.

What exactly is the ph of your water? What type of fish are you keeping in your tank?

Last edited by Cichlid Keeper at 15-Jan-2005 17:53

What is your pH, GH, and KH at the current time? What pH and GH would you like your tank to be at?

If you want to drop your pH, some driftwoods are good for dropping pH and GH. If you want to go the other way, and raise your pH and GH, there are many different types of rocks (Texas holey rock and lace rock for example) that do just that.

my pH right now is 8.0 and I would like to get angels. Im not sure about the gH

drift wood b peat moss will lower it

So do you want to lower your alkalinity? Or do you want to lower your ph to an alkaline, or alkalitic level? These are two different things, alkaline/alkalitic and alkalinity.

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my pH is too high, so I want to I want to lower the alkalinity (buffering capacity). This question may sound dumb, but I am kind of new to this hobby: what is driftwood?

Where do buffers come from? I just had someone try and tell me they wouldn't naturally be in my water. I always assumed they were naturally present.

If you tap water is 8.0ph, and you are wanting to get the ph down, I would suggest you invest in an RO unit. You can find them for less than $100, and in many cases you can even find them around $50-$75. This will remove all the substances that are buffering the ph up. Then you can add buffers to hold your ph at the lower levels. This is your best bet, if your really want to keep your water at the lower levels.

There really are no buffers to help lower the ph, at least for the problem of fish keeping. As the problem is, when lowering the ph with buffers, when the buffers disappear (through absorbtion and use), then the other "stuff" in your water will start fighting to buffer the ph up, and the ph can start fluctuating drastically and this can be detrimental to your fish.

The best way to use and control alkaline water, is to use an RO unit, then add trace minerals that will help hold the ph, but won't buffer it up. There are several on the market with different names. Like "RO Complete" and others.

The way peat and drift wood work, is they release tannins into the water, which cause a yellow or brown appearance to the water. These tannans can bond to some of the minerals that are causing the ph to be buffered up. Thus, the ph many start to come down. However, if you have things in your tank that may continue to leach into the water, it will not work. Like a calcium bases substrate will continue to leach calcium into the water, and limestone will continue to leach into the water as well. Both of these will help to buffer the ph up. Also, this method takes a while to work.

Drift wood is just the pieces of wood you see floating down the river, or out in the ocean, just "drifting" by. It is real wood, that is water logged. At your lfs, you will see these mounted to pieces of slate and such, for decoration of your tank. Just be sure you find true drift wood, as many of the wood decore is actually not drift wood, and will not do what you are looking for.

Now let me ask you a few questions; Which angels are you wanting to keep? Where have the angels you are wanting to keep come from? Are you wanting to breed your angels, or just keep them? The reason I ask these questions is, first off, many of the common angels these days have actually been bred in higher ph levels than there normal ranges in the wild are. For this reason they have addapted very well. So there would be no problem keeping them in the ph range you currently have. I have bred them in ph levels of 8.0 many times. Now if you are talking about keeping wild angels, especially the Altums, then I highly suggest you invest in an RO unit, as this will be the only way you will be able to keep them healthy and even have a chance at breeding them. If you are going to keep the common angels, I would suggest you check with your lfs you are thinking of getting them from, and see what they keep the ph at in the tank they keep their angels. I think you will find it to be probably close or the same as yours.

HTH.....

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There is always a bigger fish...