# Confused on KH GH etc and keeping Chocolates



## jayp (20 Nov 2017)

HI, Ive set up a new tank a month ago , ive kept Chocolates before with some success and some fails 

Tank has been set up using old mud/dirt/planting medium with a sand capping 
Also kept old filter going and put in new tank 

Water is  clean rain water which ive used for years 

So its a no fish cycle of new tank , now all scaped and ready  but water not ready !
25% water changes every 4 days 

LFS tested water for me today 

Ammonia  0.25
Nitrite        0
Nitrate       40
PH            6.4
GH            3
KH             0 

LFS suggestions before adding fish 
Continue with water changes and re-test in a week to see if Nitrates and ammonis dropped 

Add buffering to increase  KH 

I'm not sure about the buffering chemical ....ive kept Discus using the same water and they were fine for years 

Ive kept the \chocolates for over 12 months until I added another 3 fish ....they all died.    So I tried a fresh batch and they all died 

Hence complete revamp, change of tank to a better size   60x45x30 

Can anyone advise as my Chemistry is complete rubbish and I'm just not sure what to do that will be best for the fish ...its a nicely planted scape but low-tech 

Jan x


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## jayp (20 Nov 2017)




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## tam (21 Nov 2017)

Are adding ammonia to cycle? Adding mature filter medium is great, but the bacteria need food to survive so either fish waste (as you've added fish) or some other source of ammonia in the mean time.

Be worth checking the rainwater before you add to see what that reads too.

It's my understanding KH helps stabilise your PH, buffers it, so it's harder for it to swing about suddenly. There is discus remineralisers available you could consider to add a bit in - though check whether they actually add KH. I use Tropic Marin for my RO - I've heard people use a mix of that and Tropic Discus for a particularly low GH and low KH. I just use a slightly lower dose of the Marin - for soft water but not discus levels of soft.

Things like substrate and what you add - wood, rocks etc. can all effect the buffering so that may explain why what worked on one tank doesn't on another.


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## Edvet (21 Nov 2017)

jayp said:


> LFS tested water for me today


Sadly collecting water and bringing it to the LFS will probably create differences in the true watervalues  already. 
Choclates come from very soft water with low pH's (http://www.seriouslyfish.com/species/sphaerichthys-osphromenoides/) So just using rainwater should be sufficient (as long as it isn't polluted).
To speed up the tank you could add some easy pondplants to increase plant mass to be able to have them use ammonia and nitrites faster.

I am afraid there are a lot of choclate gouramis who don't handle the fishtrade very well, they are sensitive and need carefull handling, if not you'll end up with diseased fish. Buying these can be bad.


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## jayp (21 Nov 2017)

Thanks for replies ,
 Tam ,   LFS gave same advice which is good , they suggested the Tropic Marine and just use enough to raise KH to 3 or 4 , and retest . I have a few snails so they will need some mineral content I think .   I will also test rainwater I'm using ...good idea as although collected from a clean roof and covered it would be good to know the readings 

Edvet,  yes they are especially difficult to get through the trade , its such a shame and this will be my last attempt at keeping them, they will be the only fish in the tank in a group of 6 . I suppose I was so delighted when I kept 4 successfully I wanted a last go.   I know the set up will be good for them once ive cycled properly and the regime of 25% water changes once a week and only feeding live food works well.  Nothing else really floats my boat apart from Liqourice Gourami and no-one ever has any for sale


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## tam (21 Nov 2017)

I find a TDS pen quite handy for mixing, once you get the water to water you want (full dose of Tropic Re-Min gives you around 7GH 4KH so you probably want a bit under) then you can measure the TDS instantly with the pen and mix to that rather than having to test/estimate how much to put it.


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## Edvet (21 Nov 2017)

I keep my softwater fish in pure RO diluted with about 30% tapwater, 50-80 microsiemens.


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## tam (21 Nov 2017)

Edvet said:


> I keep my softwater fish in pure RO diluted with about 30% tapwater, 50-80 microsiemens.



I've started experimenting with that for one of our bigger tanks - our tap water is GH19.


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## jayp (21 Nov 2017)

Ive checked Rainwater today , as yes, no use doing water changes if don't know what you are changing it with .   

Came back as 0 for everything except PH was 5.9 % so a bit lower than my tank 
Ammonia 0 
Nitrite       0
Nitrate      0
PH            5.9
GH           0
KH            0

On that basis have done another 25%  water change and added minerals for full tank 
Have also added a job lot of frogbit 

Will change another 25% tomorrow


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## dw1305 (21 Nov 2017)

Hi all,
I'd add some leaf litter, we don't know quite why it works but it is <"definitely beneficial".> 





jayp said:


> Came back as 0 for everything except PH was 5.9 % so a bit lower than my tank


If you don't have any carbonate buffering (our rain-water picks up some from limestone dust) then the dissolved CO2 will lower the pH~pH5.9. 





tam said:


> Are adding ammonia to cycle? Adding mature filter medium is great, but the bacteria need food to survive so either fish waste (as you've added fish) or some other source of ammonia in the mean time.





jayp said:


> My LFS says.......Add buffering to increase KH





tam said:


> It's my understanding KH helps stabilise your PH, buffers it, so it's harder for it to swing about suddenly.


 Their is a certain kernel of truth in these, but they aren't really relevant to keeping black water fish in planted tanks.

When working out the capacity of microbial nitrification oxygen availability is the prime metric, which is why scientists refer to the bioload using Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD). Low ammonia loadings create a diverse microbial fauna that can respond changes in ammonia level. In ecology diversity brings stability. All the recent scientific research points to aquarium nitrification being overwhelmingly carried out by Archaea and COMAMMOX <"_Nitrospira_">, and they don't have the same requirements for ammonia or carbonate hardness that the bacteria which carry out ammonia oxidation in sewage treatment etc do,  <"Freshwater Recirculating Aquaculture System Operations Drive Biofilter Bacterial Community Shifts around a Stable Nitrifying Consortium of Ammonia-Oxidizing Archaea and Comammox Nitrospira"> & <"Kinetic analysis of a complete nitrifier reveals an oligotrophic lifestyle">. 

It is the same with carbonate hardness, very soft water doesn't have any, and the pH will be unstable. If you have fluctuating pH in a Tanganyikan cichlid tanks it is a problem (because the water should be so heavily carbonate buffered that it needs huge changes in water chemistry to effect pH), isn't a problem for black water fish, any addition of acids (like the CO2 in the rain-water) or bases (including dissolved oxygen) will cause changes in pH.

cheers Darrel


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## jayp (22 Nov 2017)

Blimey Darrel ....that's way over my head .  So are you saying my KH of 0 and a fluctuating PH wont matter to keeping Chocolates as they are used t such PH changes  ?   I do find all the info a bit confusing. 
I kept Marines for 5 years using rainwater ...thought my rainwater was as close to RO as necessary. I changed water often and didn't have any water issues ...the outbreak of flatworm made me give up . 

Thanks for he info ...will have a read and hop e something sinks in


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## Edvet (22 Nov 2017)

jayp said:


> they are used t such PH changes


They are, It's called weak acid reactions, these wont hurt soft water fish. (like you can drink a glas of cola (pH =2.5!!) but not a glass of batery acid (at pH 1). When i did CO2 on my big tank i had a pH drop of almost 2 full, points every day, fish never cared.


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## jayp (22 Nov 2017)

Thank you ...that would explain why I could breed Rams in just rainwater . I think maybe what I will do is use the buffer seeing as ive bought it now ...get my water to the same as LFS which is similar to mine ...we have very soft tap water round here, then slowly stop mithering with buffering and just keep water changing on a regular basis . Start adding plant ferts to keep the plants looking good . Just hope the chocos are not too stressed by transport etc and are in decent condition when I get them .


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## jayp (26 Dec 2017)

Update ....gave up on the Chocolates , didn't get any in the end , felt too bad about them dying just because I wanted them !   So change of plan ...scape is doing fab ,Buce flowering , ordered more Buce , no algae, happy days 
Had to get decent cover so had glass cut to size around light clip-ons and cables ...lordy loo la cost me £50 

Decided on Killi's  got 2 pairs of Striatum which have to say are pretty stunning , colours rival anything ive kept before , already mating daily


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## sciencefiction (27 Dec 2017)

Edvet said:


> When i did CO2 on my big tank i had a pH drop of almost 2 full, points every day, fish never cared.



That's because CO2 as an acid does not affect the KH. Its the KH drop one doesn't want as it comes with a multitude of chemical processes affecting the fish.  

I am not sure what type of nitrifying bacteria/archaea is in my water but I know it uses KH, the one we test for, during nitrification. If you set up a tank and don't do water changes, you'll see the KH drop in time steadily. And this type of drop is certainly something you don't want. The Ph may/will stay the same as long as there's some KH reading but the fish are affected nevertheless, not just by the drop of course but by the "causation". My point is, KH is used up in nitrification.  



dw1305 said:


> Their is a certain kernel of truth in these, but they aren't really relevant to keeping black water fish in planted tanks



Perhaps its true only for certain types wild caught black water fish. For the rest some KH reading would be better to keep things stable long term. With a KH of 2 for example and a very low TDS one still has good soft water environment to keep black water fish. There's no need for extremes and the Ph is not the one that matters. In nature black water fish live in very clean water, void of minerals. The Ph is an irrelevant measure but its reading is affected by certain minerals, hence just an indicator that one's water is not so "pure" .

 I've read a lot about clown loaches, which are considered blackwater fish. I can't argue statistics on a large scale but plenty of information of unsuccessful stories pointing out that "home-made" acidic water is actually detrimental to them. All my saved images are gone, otherwise I would have shown what "home-made" black water can do to "black water" fish. They do better in soft but "stable" water. And if that is not an option, they'll do better in harder but stable water, than in wildly swinging acidic water, void of buffering capacity with ph ranging from perhaps even 3 to 6. I am not a scientist and I can't tell you why that is. My guess is that non-buffered fish tank is totally not the same as black water non-buffered lake or river. There are different factors and chemical reactions at play we can't reproduce in fish tanks.


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## Edvet (27 Dec 2017)

sciencefiction said:


> KH drop one doesn't want


I keep fish in almost pure RO water, 40-50 microsiemens. Not sure how much KH is in there.


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## sciencefiction (27 Dec 2017)

Edvet said:


> I keep fish in almost pure RO water, 40-50 microsiemens. Not sure how much KH is in there.





Edvet said:


> I keep my softwater fish in pure RO diluted with about 30% tapwater, 50-80 microsiemens.



Roughly 30% of whatever your tap water is? Surely there's some KH if you're mixing with tap.


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## dw1305 (27 Dec 2017)

Hi all, 





sciencefiction said:


> My guess is that non-buffered fish tank is totally not the same as black water non-buffered lake or river. There are different factors and chemical reactions at play we can't reproduce in fish tanks.


 The scientific research in this area is very strongly suggestive that it is the humic and fulvic compounds from the leaf litter that have <"important health promoting effects for the fish">. If that link isn't available the original reference is <"Steinberg, C. 2003. Ecology of Humic Substances in Freshwaters: Determinants from Geochemistry to Ecological Niches">. 





sciencefiction said:


> And if that is not an option, they'll do better in harder but stable water, than in wildly swinging acidic water, void of buffering capacity with ph ranging from perhaps even 3 to 6.


 You are right , the pH of this type of water is inherently unstable, as soon as you buffer it you have a very different type of water. The fish have evolved in water where pH is a movable feast, the problem lies with interpreting pH. A pH of pH3 tells you that you have a 1000 proton donors (acids) for every proton acceptor (base), but it doesn't tell you anything about how many there are, just the ratio. As you move towards pure H2O pH is a fundamentally meaningless measure. We can use conductivity for tell us how many ions we have and once we get below about a fifty microS pH doesn't really help us at all.

There is a more complete discussion in <"Apistogramma forums: pool filter sand vs......."> and linked threads.

cheers Darrel


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## sciencefiction (29 Dec 2017)

dw1305 said:


> The scientific research in this area is very strongly suggestive that it is the humic and fulvic compounds from the leaf litter that have <"important health promoting effects for the fish">. If that link isn't available the original reference is <"Steinberg, C. 2003. Ecology of Humic Substances in Freshwaters: Determinants from Geochemistry to Ecological Niches">.



From what I know humic and fulvic compounds can act as a buffer in acidic tanks, thus making it less acidic, and have the opposite effect in hard water. So in a way very soft water is still buffered with that difference in a fish tank you don't know how well you've buffered it because you can't measure that type of buffer,....hence not successful for everyone. Plus I think people with black water tanks may be avoiding regular large water changes in order to utilise the life of the humic and fulvic compounds they've added. But if you're starting with water that is somewhat buffered plus keeping the TDS stable via water changes, one has a good starting point. Any drop in Kh and rise in TDS in a non-fertilised tank means pollution. Problems come when one tries to keep a particular Ph value stable. As you've mentioned, whether its stable or fluctuates, is largely irrelevant to water quality.

If one has managed to keep fish happy in completely non-buffered water,good for them. But that's not easily replicated in every fish tank. Take into account long term success as that's when issues arise, in 6 months, a year, slacking on a good few water changes and bang....fish gone...although you're still doing the same thing....


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## dw1305 (29 Dec 2017)

Hi all, 





sciencefiction said:


> If one has managed to keep fish happy in completely non-buffered water,good for them. But that's not easily replicated in every fish tank.


I definitely agree with that, some carbonate buffering makes tanks easier to manage, this is partially because you get better plant growth. 





sciencefiction said:


> Plus I think people with black water tanks may be avoiding regular large water changes in order to utilise the life of the humic and fulvic compounds they've added.


Some do large volume water changes, some don't, in either case the tanks tend to be fairly lightly stocked. 





sciencefiction said:


> So in a way very soft water is still buffered with that difference in a fish tank you don't know how well you've buffered it because you can't measure that type of buffer,....hence not successful for everyone.


The humic compounds are definitely important, you can get an estimate based on tint of the water. The darker the tint is, the more DOC is present. As an aside dKH tests don't actually measure carbonate hardness, they measure all the bases. 

It isn't a fish keeping style that every-one is going to be successful with, but a few people can keep and breed black-water fish like Chocolate and Licorice Gourami, Heckel Discus, _Dicrossus filamentosus _ etc. 

cheers Darrel


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## tam (29 Dec 2017)

Whilst on the topic, I've been wondering - what's the difference between dissolved organic compounds you get naturally in a tank (that are one of the reasons quoted for doing water changes) and the ones you get deliberately from adding things like captappa leaves?


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## zozo (29 Dec 2017)

tam said:


> what's the difference between dissolved organic compounds you get naturally in a tank


Proteïnes, sugars, (plant waste/secretion) disolving dead plant tissue, fish waste/secretion for short Detritus accumulating on/into the substrate and partialy dissolving into the water column. In nature all this will simply recycle due to natural processes over time, actualy also partialy into beneficial organic compounts. in a tiny closed invironment like an aquarium, we do not have the time and a much to small invironment. We have much more fish and plants per volume producing much more waste and actualy are over stressing the natural process capacity of this invironment. Than it only will accumulate into a toxic/pathogenic level before it can be processed to something usefull. So we must do water changes and cleaning session etc. to get rid of it.

But take for example Peat is such a very old natural processed substance made from these very same organic waste compounds that never got cleaned out and accumulated into very thick levels. And under the proper circumstances nature is able to process this dead organic material into something usefull again but it takes an awfull long time. And now after al that time it turned into peat we can use it again to add the important organic compounts which are in it to our aquarium to benefit plant and fish health. 

So bottom line, the basic compounts are initialy the same source, the difference is it needs special circumstances several processing stages and an awfull long time to turn back into something beneficial. In an aqaurium we don't have the processing capacities nor the time.. So we should take the nasty organic waste out and add the beneficial substances from materials which once were waste too, but nature already processed it for us long time ago.


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## tam (29 Dec 2017)

Thanks, that makes sense, and I presume the tree leaves are ok because the not so good stuff is reabsorbed by the tree before dropping the old leaves in autumn?


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## zozo (29 Dec 2017)

tam said:


> Thanks, that makes sense, and I presume the tree leaves are ok because the not so good stuff is reabsorbed by the tree before dropping the old leaves in autumn?



Yes correct.. This also something i learned here at ukaps (from Darrel) some time ago..  Maybe a bit overdone chances are slimm , but still because of this i only pick dead leaves that still are on the tree. Never pick 'm off the ground or from broken off branches.. Since i can't know at what stage it fell off.. If it ever fell or got ripped off in a green stage it probably still contains stuff i don't want. So picking them off the tree feels a lot safer to me..


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## tam (29 Dec 2017)

zozo said:


> Yes correct.. This also something i learned here at ukaps (from Darrel) some time ago..  Maybe a bit overdone chances are slimm , but still because of this i only pick dead leaves that still are on the tree. Never pick 'm off the ground or from broken off branches.. Since i can't know at what stage it fell off.. If it ever fell or got ripped off in a green stage it probably still contains stuff i don't want. So picking them off the tree feels a lot safer to me..



Generally, if they come off green they will go black-brown as they rot or keep the greenish hue if they dry, only the autumn already dead leaves achieve that nice thin crisp texture and light brown colour - I used to collect a lot of green leaves to dry for winter forage for my pet rabbit where you want to opposite to aquarium leaves. I think avoiding fallen branches is sensible - like you say you don't know at what point they came down and they'll react differently - like a cut flower so might reabsorb or not.


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## sciencefiction (29 Dec 2017)

dw1305 said:


> As an aside dKH tests don't actually measure carbonate hardness, they measure all the bases.



Yes, I am aware of that. That's why I am using the term KH as that's what we measure for. And a reading of KH in my opinion is what one needs as a starting point to keep things good for the fish. A reading of 1 or 2 is plenty enough and should never go down providing tank is not overstocked and is regularly water changed. Heavy nitrification and pollution moves that measure down in most cases and when it happens, things go bad for the fish. Problem is when one is trying to keep black water fish, one might get excited when their Kh is lower than initial, thinking water is getting softer, when in fact its gone very acidic, polluted, and bad for the fish. One can reproduce down-spiralling KH by just not doing water changes, overfeeding and overstocking.....The drop in Ph will come too and if looked from the wrong perspective, one would think they've magically got the best conditions for soft water fish


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## sciencefiction (29 Dec 2017)

zozo said:


> Yes correct.. This also something i learned here at ukaps (from Darrel) some time ago..  Maybe a bit overdone chances are slimm , but still because of this i only pick dead leaves that still are on the tree. Never pick 'm off the ground or from broken off branches.. Since i can't know at what stage it fell off.. If it ever fell or got ripped off in a green stage it probably still contains stuff i don't want. So picking them off the tree feels a lot safer to me..





tam said:


> Generally, if they come off green they will go black-brown as they rot or keep the greenish hue if they dry, only the autumn already dead leaves achieve that nice thin crisp texture and light brown colour - I used to collect a lot of green leaves to dry for winter forage for my pet rabbit where you want to opposite to aquarium leaves. I think avoiding fallen branches is sensible - like you say you don't know at what point they came down and they'll react differently - like a cut flower so might reabsorb or not.



He, he. Good to know. I always pick mine from the ground, can't reach the tree  But I'll watch out next time. I microwave my leaves, not sure that's a good idea as they come out rather crispy


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## sciencefiction (29 Dec 2017)

dw1305 said:


> The humic compounds are definitely important, you can get an estimate based on tint of the water. The darker the tint is, the more DOC is present. As an aside dKH tests don't actually measure carbonate hardness, they measure all the bases.



I experimented with Rooibos/Redbush tea in my tanks several times. It does move my KH down by a point or two. Of course, not enough in my hard water to affect the Ph reading. However, I stopped because I noticed my platys stress out each time from the drop, I drink a lot of that tea and I added tea bags to the tanks numerous times, when I just felt like it..... each time with consequences to the platy fish. A couple would get tiny white fuzzy spots, fungus like within a week.  I totally don't know why they're the only creatures affected or at least the only ones to visually show stress induced disease. The fuzzy spots would clear if I do a complete water change and raise the temperature, definitely a sign of fungus like issue as true fungus gets killed by higher temperature. Perhaps I drink fungus loaded Rooibos tea bags  as I can't explain it otherwise. Or perhaps the hard water loving platys don't like lower Kh. Either way, I've stopped. I only have 4 female platys left which refuse to die 

To add to my previous post, that's why I now microwave whatever goes into the tank, such as leaves, that may have stayed on the ground at some point....I drink my tea boiled too


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## tam (29 Dec 2017)

sciencefiction said:


> I microwave my leaves, not sure that's a good idea as they come out rather crispy



I've not tried it, but just watch them carefully whilst you do it - they might be a bit of a fire risk!


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## sciencefiction (30 Dec 2017)

tam said:


> I've not tried it, but just watch them carefully whilst you do it - they might be a bit of a fire risk!



Its a good point. I do...I only put them in for 30 secs to a minute..It also just crossed my mind if I should try "boiled" bags of rooibos tea instead of just dumping them in a tank.


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## zozo (30 Dec 2017)

sciencefiction said:


> He, he. Good to know. I always pick mine from the ground, can't reach the tree  But I'll watch out next time.



I fortunately have a nice place loaded with young small Oak, Beech and Alder trees standing side by side all togehter 5 minutes walk from my place. It's a dead leaf and alder cone supermarket.. Also have the comfort to pick the smalles leaves from the smallest trees i can find, this scalles and contrasts beter with the rest of the tank. The large leaves especialy the big catapa just look awfully out of place in a relative smal aquarium. Probably the thought would never crossed my mind without this luxury..


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