Lowering PH...

[Bitty]

I have always been one to give the advice to not chase PH...but I've come to the point where I think I need to lower mine to so my bristlenose plecos are more likely to breed.  I have wild caught L183, but my ph is 8.4.  I all ready have driftwood in the tank.  I do water changes every two weeks.  I usually use city water which is also hard, but I do have a water softner on the house but that only lowers hardness.  I'm thinking of getting a portable RODI system and cutting my water during water changes to the ph I want, maybe closer to 7.  What are your thoughts?  Do I need full RODI or will just RO suffice?

[face]

Yeah RO is going to be the only practical way of lowering your perimeters if you are I’d recommend doing it based of kh and gh though ph is fickle 

and if you’re gonna get an RO system, just make sure it takes standard size cartridges if at all possible small  ones can   be quite expensive imo Are you still and yaDI isn’t necessary at all 

[Tony s]

On 7/24/2024 at 1:43 PM, Bitty said:

What are your thoughts?

I'm thinking you'll want to know what you're gh and kh values are. and target around them. ph is actually the least important of these values. gh is the most important. Hving a high ph usually means your gh value is also high. To get a neutral ph, the gh values are going to need to be 8 dgh or lower. ph of 8.4 is usually a dgh around 12

Edited July 25 by Tony s

[Biotope Biologist]

Increase the amount of decay in your tank and your pH will drop precipitously. 
 

Driftwood alone doesn’t do much you want boiled leaves, heavy organics, peat. 
 

Of course adding decay to the tank will increase bioload so make sure your filter is equipped to handle the excess waste.
 

Don’t necessarily need to go straight to RODI. If your buffer (kh) is too high than you may need to consider RODI as the carbon dioxide will be “absorbed” by the buffer and hamper your pH lowering ability