Greetings fish tank friends,
I think i know the answer but i wanted to see if there are other solutions. i have a 20g guppy and mystery snail tank and 10g cherry shrimp/mystery snail tank, both planted w/ wisteria and floating frogbit.
Previously parameters were stable- ph 7.7-7.8, no ammonium, 0 nitrites, 10-20 nitrates (w/ easy green for the plants), GH300+, kH80-120. Both tanks have been seasoned for >8mo, good amount of mulm and film on algie on the substrate/back glass. these parameters are similar to local tap parameters.
I've recently hatched out a clutch of snails into each tank a few weeks ago. In the past week the kH went to zero and my pH dropped down to < 6.5. No spike in ammonia, nitrites or nitrates. Only change is the snail babies are growing fast and i've been increasing feeding (repashy/greenbeans) and added some wondershells.
The babies are growing well but i did recently lose one adult snail so i am worried they are not happy with the pH drop. I already have 1-2 lbs of crushed coral in each tank. Any other recommendations to boost my KH and stabilize the pH? I've just done a good sized water change, but i don't want to overdue it since i thought shrimp don't like big flucatuations.
Thanks!