[Amano shrimp picking at corys]

Thanks, @Helan.  Very good to know.  Still keeping an eye on my one male Amano and counting my smaller fish.  I haven't seen him chasing the rasboras lately, but he seemed pretty eager before.

[Amano shrimp picking at corys]

Hi @Helan.  Just wondering if you had any update on how your amano/cory interaction is going?  I recently had to separate a 2" amano female from a school of 1/2" kubotai rasboras because she was hunting and eating them.  Our other amano, a 1" male, seems to have taken up the chase, but he hasn't caught one yet.  Hoping to catch him before he does.  All this time I was worried about finding tank mates who wouldn't bother the shrimp.

[Do you quarantine new shrimp for your tank?]

Thanks @KaitieG and @Mmiller2001!  All good to know.  

[Do you quarantine new shrimp for your tank?]

Hi @laritheloud.  I am considering whether/how long to quarantine some incoming shrimp, and just wondered if you had any updates on how your experience went?  Did you end up using any meds proactively?  I've ordered some tank-bred neocardinas and plan to add them to my one and only tank eventually (planted, with Amanos, Kuhli loaches and tons of snails).

 

[maintaining pH with SeaChem Acid/Alkaline Buffers?]

3 hours ago, ererer said:

I'd personally stay away from acid buffers, I think it will be hard to do it with your tap water parameters without ending up with large ph swings. I'd recommend either getting an RO unit or buying distilled water. You can use crushed coral and wonder shell to raise kh and gh to target levels, or buy a buffering mix, or you can try using baking soda and epsom salt to raise gh and kh to target levels. If you can get your tank to stable water parameters, and if it's well planted and you don't have it terribly overstocked, you can work on reducing the time between water changes while maintaining stable water parameters. If your kh starts to drop, you can top off with distilled/RO water that has buffer or kh added to it. You can also keep your tanks covered to reduce evaporation and top offs.

Thanks, @ererer.  Appreciate all the suggestions.  I've been using Equilibrium for GH and will try the crushed coral for KH and go back to using distilled/RO water with my tap water to adjust pH.

[maintaining pH with SeaChem Acid/Alkaline Buffers?]

2 hours ago, Mmiller2001 said:

Do you have any rocks in your tank? Seachem says you can use it with tap water, but the reality is it's problematic without RO. My advice is to just set the KH, ignore pH and water change.

I use a different product to raise KH. The pH will be very high. But as long as GH and KH are similar, I wouldn't worry. 

My tank pH hits 6.1 and my source water is near 8.9 and I will do a 50% water change. My source TDS is 112ppm and the tank is around 170ppm. So osmotic shock is not a risk. 

If you are worried, just do more frequent smaller water changes with the adjusted source water. Eventually, the tank and source water will sync.

Thanks, @Mmiller2001.  This is very interesting.  I do have some rocks in the tank and they are supposed to raise GH and pH.  I also use Eco-Complete which I have heard raises pH, along with some driftwood and other sources of plant decay that might push the other way.  Before adding these Seachem buffers into the mix, pH had been relatively stable, with a trend of slightly increasing over time, but I found KH was low.  Will consider adopting smaller water changes or maybe shifting back to RO water, but it sounds like maybe I don't need to worry about it.

[maintaining pH with SeaChem Acid/Alkaline Buffers?]

3 hours ago, SWilson said:

This is maybe not the response you’re looking for but I’ve been using ph-lowering substrate (I think it’s the fluval stratum advertised for keeping crystal shrimp?) along with organic matter to lower my pH (normally 7.6-8) and crushed coral, wondershells, and the occasional tums tablet to keep my kH up.  My GH is always high from the tap, but I think these products help with GH as well as I’ve seen mineral balls (also for shrimpkeeping) which I assume would help boost GH.  
Someone on this forum also told me to try rooibus tea soaked water to increase tannins and help lower pH in one of my tanks that for some reason is always at about 8.4 pH.   I have not seen much difference yet, but am also timid and so probably just haven’t been adding enough. If you’re ok with the black water look, tannin-producing materials might be a good way to naturally add acids to your water. 
. . .

I’m just curious, it sounded like you were keeping animals ok in your parameters? We’re you having troubles or want to keep something else that needs lower pH or just trying to get to a better number for the animals you have?

Thanks, @SWilson, for these suggestions.  I would like a more natural and tempered approach to pH and KH management.  I'll look into these ideas.  I recently replaced the substrate with Eco-Complete, and have heard that it might cause pH to rise.

Other than the occasions when I've seen upswings in pH after water changes using these buffers, I have been pretty successful at maintaining a pH at or below 8.  The swings didn't obviously stress the animals, but they are pretty strong and I was hoping to improve my pH management before introducing less bullet-proof fish.

[maintaining pH with SeaChem Acid/Alkaline Buffers?]

3 hours ago, BIG GREEN said:

have you tried pet moss to bring down your PH so you can add the Seachem buffer to riase your KH ?

A tank that low in KH is a time bomb and could a have a crash at any point. In doing some research trying to help you find answer for your issue I just learned that  KH is consumed by nitrifying bacteria 24/7, learn something new, anyways I hope you get it figured out, crazy your PH is that high but your KH is low....makes no sense to me

Thanks @BIG GREEN, I'll look into that.  I haven't tried any methods of lowering pH other than using lower pH source water or different Seachem products.  Very interesting that KH is consumed by nitrifying bacteria.  Will need to read up on that more myself.

Mostly thanks to the Seachem Alkaline Buffer, the KH in my tank is around 8 dKH (140 ppm).  The 0-1 dKH figure is for my tap water.

[maintaining pH with SeaChem Acid/Alkaline Buffers?]

Hi @LaurieinIA!  Thanks for your response.  It's true that if you use Alkaline Buffer alone it should raise your tank's pH.  On the other hand, if you use Acid Buffer alone it should lower pH.  The two are supposed to work together to allow you to target a specific pH.  It says they work together to "adjust pH gradually" which sounds better than using either alone, though in practice I've seen more predictable results when using Acid Buffer in small amounts alone.

If I was only trying to adjust pH, I suppose I could use Acid Buffer alone with some confidence, but I also want to boost KH.

According to their instructions, Acid Buffer and Alkaline Buffer also work to adjusting KH in the tank, with Acid Buffer reducing KH some and Alkaline Buffer increasing KH somewhat more.  I have been able to use the two together to reduce pH and increase KH at the same time, which was my goal, but the pH outcome has been hard to predict.

It seems like it will be less stress on our fish to use crushed coral for KH and other water sources for pH, but would be glad to figure out how these products are supposed to work.

 

 

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

Thanks, @Patrick_G.  Glad to hear you've made it through.  Remarkable how helpful the Amanos were (and maybe the Clithons).  Even three weeks ago, most of the plants were covered with hair algae or BBA.  But one by one they were cleaned spotless.

[maintaining pH with SeaChem Acid/Alkaline Buffers?]

Hi all,

I have a 16 gallon planted tank in an area where tap water pH is high, but GH and KH are low.  The API High pH Test comes through a strong violet which looks closer to the 8.4 pH color than the 8.8 pH color on the reference card, but might also be off the chart.  The API GH and KH tests usually read 0-1.  I am keeping danios, kuhli loaches, otocinclus, amano shrimp and snails, and I've tried to keep the pH down to around 8.0 and GH/KH around 6-8.

I've tried combining bottled drinking water with tap water to match the pH in my tank, but while our bottled water is usually below 8.0 pH, sometimes it isn't.

I found the SeaChem Acid Buffer and Alkaline Buffer when looking for a source to raise KH, and have tried to use it to address my KH and pH issues, but have run into two problems.  First, the recommended ratios (such as 2.5 Alkaline to 1 Acid for a pH of 7.5) result in a lower than expected pH (varies, but around 6.5-6.8) when added to my tap water.  Second, the pH of my tank water seems to rise significantly in the 24 hours after I add buffered water to the tank.

I first tried to add Acid and Alkaline Buffer to my tap water to target my tank's pH (then 8.0).  I ended up adding significantly more Alkaline Buffer than expected.  I let the water sit for an hour and added gradually to the tank.  I tested my tank water after and saw no change, but the next day when I retested the pH was up over 8.4 (maybe over 8.8).   Fortunately the animals survived and I was able to pull the pH down by adding 1/4 tsp of Acid Buffer daily.  This seems to lower pH by less than 0.2 each time.

I've searched for suggestions on how to use these buffers, but haven't found much beyond the instructions on the backs, which don't provide much information on these issues.  I can call SeaChem, but wondered if anyone had experience with these, or would suggest another approach.  

I use Equilibrium to raise GH and have crushed coral I could use to raise KH if this Acid/Alkaline Buffer solution is a bust.

Any thoughts?

Thanks!

-Greg

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

Following up on this old post, just wanted to report that the nitrate and algae situation in this 16 gallon tank has improved significantly (knock wood).  Many thanks to @TheDukeAnumber1, @Maggie and @Superjoepez for all your advice.  Based on all your suggestions, @Irene's videos and other reading, in the last couple months I reprogrammed the light (Plant 3.0), added salvinia minima and expanded my other plants and started using SeaChem Flourish.

I did spot treatment of algae on plants with Easy Carbon and later hydrogen peroxide.  Lost a number of leaves (and tossed some leafless plants) in the process.  A few of the plants responded well, but on the whole I was more successful with pruning / removing blighted plants. 

I saw this video from Green Aqua (https://youtu.be/Rce2_BgGveU) that inspired me to beef up my clean-up crew with amano shrimp and clithon snails.  The shrimp seem to have had the largest impact.  They were under 1/2" each when they arrived, and were bullied for a while by the alpha zebra danio, but they've grown well and are now grazing around the tank.  The Green Aqua video suggests that clithon snails are more effective than (other?) nerites at eating different types of algae, but ours spend most of their time on the tank walls.

I had the lamp down to 7 hours a day, but expanded to around 8.5 hours once the algae levels dropped.  

Still dealing with some cyanobacteria and green water, but otherwise more concerned with keeping the clean up crew happy.  Now I just need to learn how to take a decent photo.

 

 

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

13 minutes ago, Maggie said:

You can spot-treat individual plants in the tank - no need to take them out.@Irene has a YouTube video (Girl Talks Fish) showing how to treat with Easy Carbon.

Thanks!   @Irene's videos have been a big help.  I will have to check that one out.

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

3 hours ago, Superjoepez said:

It would be helpful to know what plants are in there. Is that a java fern or crypt in the middle?

What substrate is that? It looks like pebbles. 
 

Also what light are you using? It looks like a Fluval Plant 3.0?
 

Making some assumptions I would say that pebble substrate with basically no CEC would mean a lot of the root tab nutrients are leaching into the water column but that also means that if you are dosing just the water column your slow growing root feeders should be getting enough nutrients from that. 
 

Now the big issue i see is your light. You say its on for 12 hours but you really have 5 hours ramp up, 2 hours full, then 5 hours ramp down. Which equates to less than 7 hours full (the times at very low light don't really do much for your plants). Your light program mimics the sun but that is a VERY HIGH light situation. For low light setups the ramping is really to just keep from shocking the fish. 
 

Try a 1hr ramp up then 6hrs full and 1hr ramp down which would equate to roughly 7hrs full. Leave this setting for 2 weeks to a month and keep a close eye on your Moneywort new growth. You already have small new growth which tells me its getting enough light but could use more. So i would definitely use your Moneywort as an indicator as to what your changes have done.
 

I had similar issues balancing light and nutrients but i have an Fluval Aquasky on a 29gallon (A lot less light in a deeper tank). Take one variable at a time starting with light and make it easy on yourself, dont mimic the sun use 1hr ramp up and down times.

Thanks a lot for your thoughts here.

You are right that the light is a Plant 3.0 and the substrate is pebbles.  They are covered with acrylic paint, FWIW.  The plant in the center is a crypt.  

I've switched the light to 1 hour ramps and the reduced lighting schedule and will keep an eye on the moneywort as you suggest.

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

6 hours ago, Maggie said:

I second the floating plants and Easy Carbon - in one aquarium, my nitrates are NEVER above 5ppm even with dosing fertilizer, and I know it's the salvinia minima taking care of most of it because they never stop growing and reproducing! In another, I was having a black beard algae problem that almost killed my java fern and water sprite, I was seeing nitrates around 40ppm. Now that the BBA is under control (not quite gone yet) using spot treatment with Easy Carbon, the plants are starting to take off.

Thanks, Maggie.  All very helpful!  Glad to hear you've had success with BBA.  Have you been removing plants and drying before applying Easy Carbon?  I can pull some of my plants, but not sure what to do with the ones rooted in the substrate.

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

6 hours ago, TheDukeAnumber1 said:

A few floating plants may help. Since your other plants are getting root tabs some floating plants will help take nutrients out of the water column and compete with the algae.

Or an algicide like Easy Carbon or Seachem Excel may work.

Thanks a lot for these ideas.  I will def look into some floating plants.  I have done some spot treatment with Easy Carbon, but will try doing more.

[Balancing lightly planted tank to control algae?]

Hi everyone,

Just checking in with a request for any thoughts on balancing light and nutrients for our lightly planted tank to control algae.

We have a 16 gallon tank with a handful of "easy" slow growing plants, and a small company of fish and snails.  We've had the tank for about 10 months now.

We've been trying to manage cyanobacteria and a few types of algae (lately green water and some fine, long green hairs) - with a UV sterilizer, Maracyn, cleaning the substrate and plants by hand a few times a week and water changes once weekly - usually 20%, but 40% every fourth week.

We've cut back further in the past month on light to help fight the algae (still 12 hours, but at peak of 30%), and moved from a norm of <5ppm nitrates to a norm of >40ppm nitrates.

We used to fertilize with Easy Green up to 20ppm nitrate, but with nitrates at >40ppm, we've switched to a single round of root tabs (5 or 6) and SeaChem Equilibrium instead of Easy Green.

The tests we have (all API) show pH 7.2, ammonia 0ppm, nitrite 0ppm, nitrate 40ppm, phosphates 1ppm, KH 5 and GH 6.

Any thoughts on what direction to go next?  Should we keep cutting back on light in hopes that the algae will come under control, and increase water changes to deal with the nitrates?  If so, should we target a specific nitrate ppm in our changes?  Should we look to get below 20ppm so we can go back to adding Easy Green?  Any additional tests we should be running to see whether a lack of a specific nutrient could be holding back plant growth that could consume those nitrates and maybe dent the algae?   Should we be aiming for higher KH/GH figures?  Planting more?

The tank is in a room that gets a lot of light in the morning and is often lit at night.  We cover the sides of the tank when its light is off, but a partial exposure on the top lets light in.  Any thoughts on whether we should be more aggressive in blacking out the tank at night while still allowing oxygen exchange?

Thanks!

[Hello from the Bay Area]

Good to know.  Thanks a lot for taking the time!

[Hello from the Bay Area]

3 hours ago, Koi said:

Oh man I forgot about the otos, definitely save some for them haha. If you're doing weekly water changes, your problems will clear up in no time I wouldn't even worry about nutrient buildup. If I can suggest one 2 more things, I'm assuming you probably do 20-30% water changes, you could benefit to do a 50% every now and then just to be sure you reset your parameters and try remove decaying organic matter when you can. If your plants are still transitioning you'll have some dead leaves you'll need to take out for the next couple weeks.

Other than that you're on the right track and you'll have a booming tank in no time, keep it up and good luck

Thanks, Koi.  Good to know.  You're right I've been doing 20-30% changes -- vacuuming out waste from the substrate in the front, but leaving the planted areas in the back undisturbed.  I remove decaying plant matter wherever I find it.

Ammonia, nitrite and nitrates (before fertilizing) are consistently low.  Is there something I should look to to see whether it's time for a 50% water change?  

[Hello from the Bay Area]

Thanks, Koi.  Appreciate the advice.  We are doing much better with the algae now, but still remove what we can during what are now weekly water changes.  I try to leave some for the otos if they seem interested.

Planning to add a few more plants this week to help take up the load in the foreground.

We stopped using the Phosguard once the phosphate level dropped below 2 ppm.  We were off the charts of our API test kit when we started.

[Hello from the Bay Area]

Thanks, quirkylemon103!  Sorry to hear about your otos.  The khulis don't seem to take an interest in the snails.  

I was adding the phosphate without knowing what it was.  That Seachem Neutral Regulator, which is supposed to maintain a pH of around 7.0, uses phosphate to help maintain that level.  Not sure why it would make sense to make a product for tanks using phosphate, but I've heard people say they would only recommend for tanks with low lighting.  I was adding the Seachem with every water change and didn't realize until I bought a phosphate testing kit.  Since then, I've stopped trying to adjust the pH with chemicals.  It took a few rounds of phosguard to bring our phosphate levels down to a reasonable level.

The picture here shows from right to left my source water, treated with Fluval Aqua Plus and then with the Neutral Regulator.

[Hello from the Bay Area]

Thanks, Michelle.  Good to know!  Seems like they might be our best option.

[Hello from the Bay Area]

Thanks, Jack.

Appreciate the ideas and the advice on how to chose a betta.

[Hello from the Bay Area]

Hi everyone,

I've been reading this forum for a while and have really appreciated all the thoughtful discussions.  After decades without a tank, I set one up in April in response to family demand.  It's since turned into a personal battle with algae -- fascinating for me, but my wife is not a fan.  She wants clear water and beautiful fish, and I haven't provided either.

We have just the one tank -- a 16 gallon, crowded with a UV sterilizer and power head to assist the hang-on-back filter.  We are getting light (plant 3.0 at max 40% capacity) and phosphates (added with Seachem's Neutral Regulator, removed with Phosguard) under control, fertilizing our few plants with Easy Green to 20 ppm nitrates, and hoping that clarity is not that far away.  Lately dealing with a new round of green water and a daily blanket of cyanobacteria.  Hoping the UV sterilizer will help, and erythromycin is on the way.

We started out with four zebra danios.  All are still here, now with a couple otos, three kuhli loaches, two nerites and a handful of other snails from a stowaway.  We've lost a few otos, but so far no other fish. 

Hoping to move some day from setting up this tank to populating it with something that will impress the wife but will not bully or be bullied by our other fish.  My original plan was to go with smaller schooling fish, but she's more interested in seeing one or two showcase fish.

Would appreciate any thoughts on stocking and whether we should hold off until we have the algae under better control.  The picture below was taken almost a month ago, when it seems like we were in better shape.  Not a great shot, but hopefully gives you a sense of where we're at.

We're running a pH around 7.8 and temperature around 76-77F.

Thanks!

-Greg