ph problems

[Paul Evans <pm_evans@yahoo.com>]

Hello,

please forgive me if this has been 
beaten to death in some prior thread.
I joined the list a short time ago.

I have a 45 gallon US tank.  I use
RO water with a little bit of tap
for my water changes.  My carbonate
and general hardness measure in the
"very soft" range using the Tetra
hardness test kit.  

The ph of my tank sits between 7.0 and
7.2.  I have read a great many stories
about tanks filled with RO water 
naturally falling down into the acid 
range and that is what I would like
mine to do.  I am sure this would make
my tetra's and apisto happier.  However,
it stays pegged right around 7.  

Last week I bought some Seachem Acid and
Alkaline buffers.  I mixed them in the 
proper ratio to buffer the PH at 6.5 with
dreams of going lower later.  I put only
half of the recommeneded amount of the mixture
since I expected that to be adequate 
for water as soft as mine.

The ph went down to about 6.5 and then 
within twelve hours was back at 7.2.  I
did not expect the bounce back in a buffered
environment.  

I then changed out about 1/3 of the water 
and replaced it with R/O.  Then I put enough
of the buffer mixture in to bring the tank
up to the recommended concentration of the
buffer.  The ph went down to 6.5 thing 
bounced back to 7.2 overnight.  I don't
want to experiment with this anymore because
the ph bounce is hard on the fish.

What could be causing this with water so
soft?  If I had some bad rocks or gravel
wouldn't that also drive up my carbonate
hardness?  My rocks are sandstone, "rainbow"
slate, petrified wood, and granite.  I put
some sulfuric acid on them and observed no
reaction.

The other day I got some roots to put in the
tank but have not done so yet.  I hope these
will acidify the tank but given my observations
so far I am not so sure.  

Before I sign off I should say that I have had
this tank for about a year and I have tried a 
number of times to lower the ph using just acid
and had experience no sucess.  I saw the buffer
as a silver bullet.

Lastly, after getting this problem sorted out
I would like to get some more apistos.  Does 
anyone know of a fish store in the San Franciso
Bay Area that often has some.  I have seen 
them at the Dolphin Pet Center in Campbell
and at two places in Sacramento.

Thanks for any advice.

Paul Evans   




_________________________________________________________
DO YOU YAHOO!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the apistogramma mailing list, apisto@majordomo.pobox.com.
For instructions on how to subscribe or unsubscribe or get help,
email apisto-request@majordomo.pobox.com.
Search http://altavista.digital.com for "Apistogramma Mailing List Archives"!