A few questions..

[Tiffany]

Howdy everyone,

I am curious about raising my ph (without adding "chemicals"). I have med/mod hardness in the water and my ph is around 7..I have a community tank, all of which can live in neutral ph but prefer a little higher. I would like it to go to 7.4 if possible. I added some aragonite to the tank but did not see much difference. Any ideas?

My second question is about a couple female guppies. Yesterday I noticed 2 female guppies breathing rapidly and one laying on the ground..the other is not much higher off the ground. I got home from work this afternoon and noticed that they are still breathing rapidly and not much has changed. Any ideas? Everyone else in the tank seems to be doing fine still. 

Also, I got 3 pieces of cholla wood to add to my tank..it floats.. I kept it submerged and soaking for 3-4 days..still floated. What did I do wrong??

Thank you in advance for your help!!

[ChefConfit]

Try boiling the cholla, I brought mine to a boil and turned the pot off. It sank by the time the water cooled

[Mr. Ed's Aquatics]

If you run HOB or canister filters, try adding a bag of crushed coral. If not, you can add it to the substrate. 

As for the guppies, are they boxing? I notice mine hang out near the bottom and breathe a little harder right before they drop fry.

[Wmarian]

I found crushed coral results in a lower* (correction: higher) ph,but very gradually over a couple weeks. Aquarium Coop recommends starting with 1 lb per 10 gallons. Don't know what amount of aragonite would be needed or pace of change.I  put crushed coral in media bags rinse thoroughly and place behind stones and plants. My ph has slowly risen to 7.6. Aquarium Coop says leaching from the coral slows in about 6 mnths and needs to be replaced...I figured the bags would be easiest to change out when that time comes.

Other products for raising PH are baking soda (does it way too fast, hard to keep consistent, can blow your ph up) and Seachem products (equilibrium, buffering additives, etc.). I found guidance about the Seachem products to be really confusing, though.

Keep monitoring. The first thing that crushed coral and aragonite additives do is raise kh. And that impacts ph. Are you measuring kh and gh? Higher hardness (kh and gh) preferred by guppies and keeps them healthier. If your kh already high, coral and aragonite might not make much of a difference to your ph.

Check the impact of the cholla wood on your tank ph. My tank, with no kh in my tap water, dropped below 6 ph when I added driftwood. Adding coral added kh which helped maintain a higher ph, even with driftwood.

And what temperature and other parameters for your guppies' tank?

 

Edited July 26, 2020 by Wmarian
Corrected

[Cory]

2 hours ago, Wmarian said:

I found crushed coral lowers ph,

 

Just to make sure we aren't confusing things, I assume you mean raises the pH? I've never seen it lower pH. 

[Mr. Ed's Aquatics]

1 hour ago, Cory said:

Just to make sure we aren't confusing things, I assume you mean raises the pH? I've never seen it lower pH. 

I think he means raises by the context of the directions on how much to add.

Just clarifying, crushed coral at worst stabilizes the PH but almost always raises it. The more you ad, the more it raises it. Great natural way to get your PH up or keep it from crashing. 

[Tiffany]

@ChefConfit I will definitely give boiling a try!! Thank you!!

@Edward Steven I will add some to the substrate again. Boxing..?? ( I am a green horn in the hobby so not 100% sure what that means, however, after reading the rest of your comment and hearing Cory say the females look a little more square before dropping the fry I guess that is the term) I hope they are going to spit some babies out!! They both look plump! The last time I seen a female act like that she died..never seen any fry. Do you know approximately how long they do this before hatching? Anyway, thank you for the info!! 

@Wmarian I think the aragonite is the same as the coral as far as 1lb per 10gal. I will get a media bag or 2 to put into the tanks. I added some a while back but I don't think it was a pound. I am using the tetra test strips and that is giving me med/mod gh & kh. The temp I keep both tanks at is 78 degrees, the zero chlorine, nitrite and 20-40ppm of nitrate. (dose using easy green for plants.) Thank you for the info!

 

Thank you all for your replies!! I will give all this a try and keep my eyes on everything!! 😁

Edited July 25, 2020 by Tiffany

[Tiffany]

Well as an update..

One female spit out babies last night, the other had a weird white bump (didn't look fuzzy) Come up on her side so she got tossed into the quarantine tank.

I boiled the chills wood and the crap still floats..I boiled it 4 times.

[Brandy]

Cholla took a long time to sink for me too. I finally stuck a small rock in the middle of the largest piece to help hold it down.

Regarding pH and coral/argonite. Depending on the starting pH and hardness of your water that can be a slow shift. Be patient there. The mechanism is that more acidic water will dissolve the coral/argonite and as it does will raise the pH and GH/KH, and the process will slow. If your water is fairly hard with close to neutral pH it will take longer to have an effect. This is a good thing, as sudden shifts are harder on the fish. If you keep adding more and more you may blow past your target. How long has the argonite been in there?

[TheDukeAnumber1]

On 7/24/2020 at 7:49 PM, Tiffany said:

I am curious about raising my ph (without adding "chemicals")

What do consider a "chemical" and why not use them?

[Tiffany]

On 7/27/2020 at 11:20 AM, TheDukeAnumber1 said:

What do consider a "chemical" and why not use them?

Something, like Ph up/down etc. I feel like products like that can sometimes cause more problems then its worth if you have planted tanks with snails and fish.  Of course, I should add that I am totally new and don't know much of anything about products in general. I'm very much still learning and am trying to not kill off to many if any of my aquatic friends..lol

[Tiffany]

On 7/27/2020 at 10:37 AM, Brandy said:

Cholla took a long time to sink for me too. I finally stuck a small rock in the middle of the largest piece to help hold it down.

Regarding pH and coral/argonite. Depending on the starting pH and hardness of your water that can be a slow shift. Be patient there. The mechanism is that more acidic water will dissolve the coral/argonite and as it does will raise the pH and GH/KH, and the process will slow. If your water is fairly hard with close to neutral pH it will take longer to have an effect. This is a good thing, as sudden shifts are harder on the fish. If you keep adding more and more you may blow past your target. How long has the argonite been in there?

I got 1 piece to partially sink so I stuck in in the tank with IT (That is the name for the clown pleco currently.) I left the other 2 pieces in the water for a few days now and am going to boil it again in hopes it will go ahead and give up. lol.

I have had the other in there for about a month. I have done some water changes (1 was a total accident and basically done a 98% change, the other was about a 20-30% change) I haven't added any more since then but the parameters do not seem to be changing much if any. I ordered some filter bags from the coop and am going to add some aragonite to the bags and dropping them in the tank. I'm honestly not sure if I added a pound for the 10 gal so that might be why I did not see any changes.🙄

[Mr. Ed's Aquatics]

39 minutes ago, Tiffany said:

Something, like Ph up/down etc. I feel like products like that can sometimes cause more problems then its worth if you have planted tanks with snails and fish.  Of course, I should add that I am totally new and don't know much of anything about products in general. I'm very much still learning and am trying to not kill off to many if any of my aquatic friends..lol

I can't agree more with you here. Don't chase your PH with chemicals. First and foremost, it's unnecessarily expensive. More importantly, it puts an unnecessary burden on yourself... i.e. "I better keep up with my buffers or all my rainbows are toast". Not relaxing at all, much easier to either just keep species that do well with your water or balance the tank with natural solutions. With different woods, rocks, sands, substrates or coral you can raise or lower the PH without constant maintenance or the risk of crashing. 

 

[Brandy]

55 minutes ago, Tiffany said:

I have had the other in there for about a month. I have done some water changes (1 was a total accident and basically done a 98% change, the other was about a 20-30% change) I haven't added any more since then but the parameters do not seem to be changing much if any.

You should probably count from the 98% water change. That could reset you. I think adding a little at a time is a great plan. Add some, wait a week, test before the next water change, repeat.