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I have been reading up on water buffer but don't think I unstand what it is used for? does it come in a bottle?
I have soften well water I have no control over the softeners It is done but the community that I live in. My water is soft .how would I make it hard for African cichlids?

Buffers can be various things but are generally calcium carbonate(kh). Incidentally that's the same thing as baking soda. General rule higher kh equals higher ph. To raise kh you can just add plain baking soda. Alternatively you can use buffers sold for fish tanks which are usually labelled as containing carbonic acid salts. Kent has several and I've used ph stable when setting up tanks of only RO water.

Hardness is not just buffers and ph though. You also have to look at the gh or general hardness when keeping hardwater fish. Baking soda will barely affect the gh and products sold specifically to buffer water will not have a noticeable effect on gh. You need to either use a product designed to raise both or a product to raise gh along with what your using for kh. Easiest thing to use is Kent's ro right. Raises both equally but you can't get as detailed. Otherwise if say using baking soda instead of buying something more expensive you can also use something like Seachem's equilibrium which only raises gh. My favorite is to do that so I can control kh and gh seperately.

Pretty much all buffers and gh products come in powdered form and you mix them into your water change water before adding to the tank to slowly increase the levels. A tank with no fish you could mix directly into the tank and wait for it all to dissolve and stabilize then add it to any new water after that. You can get concentrated liquid versions but they cost more, don't last as long, and sometimes seperate so they aren't as accurate.

Found a baking soda amount calculator but haven't tested it: http://www.dataguru.org/misc/aquarium/calKH.asp