Help a with water parameters/stocking ideas?

[KungFuKoi-ish]

I just flooded the 10 gallon that had been dry started - it looks amazing and I’m dead set on dry starting everything I can now. That’s beside the point.

Now when constructing the tank I placed 2 pounds of aragonite (along with some lava rock) in a mesh bag in the substrate hoping it would balance out the mess of ADA Amazonia II. Fat chance.

Currently, according to the Coop test strips, the water parameters are as follows:

GH: 150

KH: 0

PH: less than 6.4

The water out of the tap is about 300/50/7 for reference.

As far as I can understand, these parameters are not ideal for guppies or neocaradina, and I definitely want to change that. So I’m all ears for suggestions on how to increase the KH/pH to make the tank a suitable habitat for some beautiful Purple Dragon Mosaics and Blue Bolts!

Now, if that is going to be a struggle due to the liters of ADA in there, I’d love for some suggestions on what I could stock in this tank.

Thank you kindly for your time and input! 

 

[Patrick_G]

I dry started this little tank. It takes time, but it’s pretty easy. 
Your tank looks great. I think you could keep guppies although they might like the ph to be a bit higher. Maybe you could put some crushed coral in the filter. That’ll help raise your buffer and keep your PH up. My guppies breed and seem to thrive in 6.4-6.8 

[KungFuKoi-ish]

That’s a beautiful looking tank yourself!

So I took your advice and replaced the bio-media in the powerhead with aragonite, about as much as I could pack in there. Already there’s been just the slightest increase in KH (from neon yellow to lime green) so it seems to be working! I’ll give it some more time to see if that brings things up a little bit.

If you know, does aragonite have the same buffering capacity of crushed coral?

Also! If I piled up mounds of crushed coral behind the hardscape would there be enough flow to affect the parameters? Or does this need to be blasted by water to really get going?

Thanks again for your help!

[Patrick_G]

I’m not sure about aragonite’s buffering capacity vs crushed coral, but I have put filter bags of crushed coral behind hardscape and seen good results. It took a while to move the parameters but it definitely worked.

[lefty o]

well planted 10 gallon, id go for a bunch of ember tetra's. can have a decent quantity of them in a 10, and they really look good with plants.

[KungFuKoi-ish]

Update: After a water change and a week parameters have stabilized at just under 40 KH and right about 6.4 pH - this is with about 2 oz of aragonite in the filter. Thanks again for the suggestion, worked like a charm!

@lefty o

Those are beautiful little fish, thanks for the suggestion! I may drop a few in there, do I need a minimum number for their well being?