Help! I tested my tank water and found an reading I don’t understand!

[Troy B]

Help!

Please.  I tested my water with the Aq.Coop test strips and an odd reading came up!

The water hardness portion of the strip turned a darker shade of pink, not a shade of blue as the chart indicated it should.

What does this mean?

Any help would be extremely appreciated since I have fish coming and no where to put them!

Best regards 

Troy B.

[Troy B]

Just got an email from Candi who said I needed “More Buffer”?  But I’m already at a high-medium according to the test strip... I don’t get how that will help?  Just trying to understand what it actually means... is my water Too Soft or Super hard?  And how will adding crushed coral help?  Now more confused than before.

[Kirsten]

Wow! Judging from your KH as well, I think that means you have super duper hard water.

One way to test, if you can get some distilled or RO water from the supermarket, try mixing it 50/50 in a clean container with some of your tap water and try another reading. Distilled water should be all 0, so whatever you read with this half & half mix is half your actual water hardness.

[Brandy]

Hmm. While I expect Candi knows more about this than I do, agree with @Kirsten, and think a test with a distilled water mixture is a good idea. I would agree that looks like you have surpassed the test range, the question is what direction....

[Tinyfellows]

My gh is always around 300 and I got a pink reading the other day and chalked it up as bad strip. The next tone I tested I got a normal reading. 

[Troy B]

I thought that too initially.  So I checked it with a second strip.  Same results.

Then I checked my tap water just too see what it was... same results (with the exception of the chlorine and nitrates and nitrites, which I expected).

[Troy B]

Update:

So after a 75% water removal, I put in r/o water to fill the tank.  The resulting test brought the hardness down to a medium high level.  So it appears that I’ll never use my tap water to do water changes or top offs.  Fortunately, I caught it in the first of my nano tanks before my fish arrived.  

Will the “Super Duper Hard water” affect my plants too much?  They were in it for about two weeks. It’s my first planted tank so I went with those plants marked on the Aq.Coop website as “easy” to care for.

thoughts?

[Cory]

Super hard water for 2 weeks shouldn't have an effect on the plants.  It appears your hardness was off the charts.

[Kirsten]

9 hours ago, Troy Brion said:

So after a 75% water removal, I put in r/o water to fill the tank.  The resulting test brought the hardness down to a medium high level.  So it appears that I’ll never use my tap water to do water changes or top offs.  Fortunately, I caught it in the first of my nano tanks before my fish arrived.  
 

Well, there are a lot of fish out there that like hard water. You can watch Cory's video on it here:

I don't know HOW hard they like it, but depending on the fish you get, you may be able to still use tap water for top-offs and maybe a mixture for water changes.

[Mitch_ScruffyCityAquatics]

I get 300 at the one minute mark and within a few seconds my GH begins to turn pink. I think my water is just super hard. 

[Troy B]

On 4/27/2021 at 6:04 AM, Kirsten said:

Well, there are a lot of fish out there that like hard water. You can watch Cory's video on it here:

I don't know HOW hard they like it, but depending on the fish you get, you may be able to still use tap water for top-offs and maybe a mixture for water changes.

Thanks so much.  I’m gonna watch it now.  I appreciate your thoughts and help!

~T