Im just restumbled upon this video. And this was the video that brought me to this channel if I remember correctly. It blew my mind because I had not heard of using natural materials to alter my water chemistry. I was hooked after I learned that, because it made me think about everything differently. Just wanted to share a happy memory.
Now I recommend not even messing with ph because it can throw off from hydrogen molecules hence spikes directly after water changes. TDS is better to follow which meters are cheap. Having living water is the most important. Also would probably add a few things to the more to the list of what you can use from nature to alter chemistry.
Use a peat granules that are being used for filters. I had red tetras and other types and neons and I believe cabomba or something similar plants in 120 gallon aquarium. My water was Las Vegas hard water. Used half a handful peat in a bag and hanged in aquarium, deem light, also a boogwood. In the early morning my tetras were and I believe neons were breeding laying eggs all over plants... and the water was slightly yellowish
What a great video. Mentioning the spagma moss alone was worth my time but the assessment of Ph down (which I have always been skeptical of) makes this video a must see for anyone with south american fish. Thanks man.
I use Phosphoric acid in a mixture of RO and HMA water to lower the Ph to water ever number you desire. I have bred and kept all my wild Betta using a combination of all 3 of the above, this includes several pairs of Betta Macrostoma. I have also kept and bred several species of Parosphromenus down to Ph 3. In terms of the amount of acid we talking about it is drops from a pipettes as opposed to mls. A lot of the Catappa leaves are cut green and dried which is not what you want. You can also use Catappa concentrate.
When i bred Neon Tetras back in the 80s i used Scottish peat , It stayed like clay and lay firm on the bottom of the tank .They spawned like crazy using that.
It's a lot more reliable and consistent to use R/O water, then re-mineralize and add alkaline and acid buffers until you get what you want. It's also cheaper in the long term and if you are doing it to lots of water. The organics that you talk about here will affect it in unpredictable ways, and if you have high KH, the leaves will hardly change your ph at all. Another thing to think about is a lot of low PH animals and plants also want lower GH and KH, which either requires R/O or rainwater and remineralization. I love using organics for other purposes, but I just don't find it reliable for affecting ph.
Hello Team LRB Aquatics, does using the Spaghnum Moss bring down only the PH or does it bring downs the GH (General Hardness) also? Also how long does the spaghnum moss last?
It depends on how sensitive your fish or shrimp are. To be safe do smaller water changes. In the salt water hobby they will do 20% water changes without matching the ph but they do try to match the ph on bigger water changes.
L.R.Bretz's Aquatics already have man it's the time diff I'm on holidays from work usually finish when u start back tomorrow so hopefully catch a lot more still great to watch anyways 👍🏻
I ended up going with the spagnum moss. Bought a quart of this stuff for 20 gallon caridina shrimp tank.Did it to keep Ph down, keeping my fingers crossed 🤞
A professional fish farmer just told me to use hydrochloric acid from hydroponics store. And let the water sit for 3 days before adding it to aquariums. And if you use enough peroxide to kill algae, it always kills your bacteria.
That will definitely make it more acidic. I’m not a fan of chemical cocktails like that personally. Hydrochloric acid is also what are stomachs consist of to break down food. Do be careful with that stuff cause it can destroy the beneficial bacteria as well.
Earned a sub 👍 Angelfish all day, pH is key when it comes to my Angels. Nice video some good options for others and points of interest. Happy fishing 😊
So I just purchased some sphagnum moss. Should I just place some into a bucket with RO water and use that water for my tanks? Or do you recommend placing it directly into the shrimp tanks? Also, when it starts to rot, do I just leave it in the bucket of water or do I replace it? Thank you so much for this informative video. Cheers!
You could do it either way. It’s more natural and can look cool to just put in to as part of the scape. Plus shrimp and other organisms can eat it as it breaks down. If just in a bucket it may start to smell if decomposes to fast which has a lot to do with light on decomposition rate. Less light faster decomposition. But if regularly using the water for weekly water changes then it should naturally exchange its nutrients from decomposition in each water change. Think of it as the plant breaks down it becomes part of the water.
How long must you leave the moss in the aquarium once the tank has hit the pH that you desire doesn’t need to be removed or should it be left in? I’m assuming if it should be left in for extremely hard water situation that it might be possible to put the filter bag in a canister filter?
Lucas my water is soft and i plan on adding crushed coral to the 40 gallon breeder tank for cherry shrimp to graze on. How much crushed coral should i add and how do i tell when to add more? Thanks for the great videos
I would add about a cup, you can pile it in one spot, sprinkle it around, or crush it up and sprinkle it around. Crush coral consist of a lot of calcium and as long as the shrimp can graze on it you will be good. It will last a long time, years. Thanks for watching!
Good thing to do is what I do is set up a 30g drum or anything that can hold a lot of water and have that already treated and lowered so you never have to worry about shocking the fish with those ph down products
Like your video. Lot's of tips for me to try. My question is. I have a 65 gal planted freshwater tank with pressurized co2, running 8-10 bps for 9 hrs a day. Which keeps my PH around 6.8-7.0. However the ph jumps at night to around 7.8-8.0. My fish and plants are doing alright but it shouldn't fluctuate that much. I also have shrimp and Mystery snails. I have peat moss, Alder cones and API pillow in my tank and nothing seems to keep it stable. Also battling BBA. I don't have any rocks or crush coral or anything that would raise the PH. My tank has been set up for several years now so it is well aged. My tap water is between 7.1-7.5. I do a weekly water change of 25%. The water is stored for a week adding Prime to it. Ready for the next change. I am at my wits end trying to keep my PH stabled. Is there anything you could suggest to keep it stabled? Thanks
Do you know your TDS or more importantly your GH and KH? It is staying low during the day becuase of the co2. I guessing you have hardish water. Could be from the plants as well. PH is actually per hydrogen, so something molecular is happening which is the fact the plants are absorbing the oxygen at night and leaving the hydrogen.
Try filtering through peat(an aquarium brand such as Sera or Fluval) or green sphagnum. Akadama can be used as a substrate and will soften water and reduce ph. Also, can you use distilled water one time in your water changes as a test to see if it helps?
I believe it, mornings are when most tetra types tend the spawn and you apply some of real mother nature usually triggers them. I will have to keep this in mind.
On the tank you used the hydrogen peroxide on, how much did you use and were the plants in when you treated it? I have a couple of plant only tanks with algae issues and am looking for solutions.
2 ml , gallon is what I used. I dose in tanks with the plants in it. Subwassertang didnt like it much though besides that have tried it with many other types.
Hey I do use osmos water and when k add mineral I do heve a hell to lower my ph when I lower it its take 1 day and then its high again take me 4 days to lower it and make it stay
Hi, I have a question, I’m trying to use this moss to lower the ph in my fish tank and I was wondering, if I did submerge it in water, how long do I need to wait until I replace it. When will it’s ability to lower my ph stop?
@LRB Aquatics I just came from Jack Wattley's channel and he gave the suggestion of adding some muriatic acid in a separate bucket of water then waiting for 3 days and then using that water to lower your pH. Do you know if this would be safe for shrimp? Thanks in advance. P.S. Thanks for your continuous livestreams and I hope to keep learning from you about this hobby! This is the video in question: HOW TO: lower PH for your Tropical Fish Tank - RU-vid
New, thanks for posting about the natural ph down stuff. Can you tag Aquaponics in your videos? Because I have been looking for a ph down natural way for a couple weeks. I tried the chemical way and it killed my half my fish and didn't lower my ph.. I knew about peat moss filtration but didn't know it removed ph. Thanks.
I'm so sad. I was doing all my readings and everything looked fine. All my big ugly goldfish died. I loved my ugly fish! My ph is 8.2. Pretty sure that's what did it. I have sphagnum moss for gardening. Can I use that? I only have my cherry shrimp and pleco left. I really just want to keep either goldfish or a betta. My bettas kept dying too. Thg he other fish are doing great in hard water in my other tank. I have my platys and guppies in that one. I have a cory in there but he's not doing well. I would like to lower the ph in at least the 29 gallon so I can put some bettas in there.
Yeah the spaghnum works much quicker. The harder your water the more it buffers. I dont ever measure pH myself but go off TDS to determine if my water is hard or soft.
Hi LR, I was wondering if you could help me. I have a highly planted tank with an internal sump which I have plants also growing out of and a hollow tree stump in the middle of the tank. Both the stump and one part of the sump has Sphagnum moss with lava rock in it with plants growing out of them, so the roots get into the water to help with nitrates. The plants are doing great inside and out of the tank and previously I did a similar thing with all three sump compartments with Sphagnum moss and lava rock and never had this problem. My problem is my ph has dropped below 6. I use RO water and remineralizer and the ph before that and after is 6.5 to 6.6 and that's what the tank use to set at steady with my old set up. I want to put soft water fish in the aquarium, but I don't know if they can handle the ph in the 5's. I want balloon rams, bumble bees and kohli loaches in there. I have them in quarantine at the moment at 6.5 and they are doing fine. Should I take out all the Sphagnum and use something else and if so what could I use? Or should I switch to tap water which has a ph at over 8 and have the Sphagnum lower it for me (to me this seems to be very unstable). I have added shell grit and it doesn't budge the ph at all, but its so low I can see the water reacting with the grit if I look carefully. I also have rock in there and a martini glass with aquasoil as a pot with more plants, plants in the sand substrate, 2 compartments have pots with aquasoil in the pots with terrestrial plants growing out of them. If I switched to pots of aquasoil in the stump and the third compartment and got rid of all the Sphagnum, do you think it would buffer to 6.5 better. My Kh is 3 at the moment, so I think it just has buffered and stayed at that very low ph because of the Sphagnum. What are you suggestions with this please?
I'm going to put the bumblebees in the other community tank with a higher ph now. I think the rams and kohli's like acidic water and might get some glass cats and maybe some killifish now.
The bumblebee would more than likely do better in harder water like you mentioned. There are a few types of bumble bee gobies. The aquasoil can be a big factor in the low ph making the water acidic as well as the sphagnum moss. An airstone can raise the pH so can limestone. Mayb try removing the sphagnum or aquasoil in the container. The fish may be ok with the 5 ph but not 100% sure....
Yes, it was the aquasoil that is part of it. I used tap water of over 8 and removed all the sphagnum and it still leveled out to 6.4. But before I moved the bumble bees I checked that water too and it was at 6.5 and they were all doing very well for 3 weeks in there, so still moved them with the others. I did add a little marine salt for them, which didn't budge the ph at all, but not enough to be considered a brackish tank, as I have so many plants that wouldn't cope with high salt at all. But they all seem to be doing great in the low ph, except my male balloon ram decided to jam itself in between a rock and driftwood when it first went in and injured his eye, it looks like a cataract kind of thing. I don't know if will improve or not, but he is acting completely normal now. He settled in once he saw the other fish and I added some tetra's in there too and he follows the school around the tank and chases the female. I made sure the kh and gh were right too. I had to add some more shell grit in a bag too, but it worked with the kh and thats sitting on 4. The gh was at 6. I want to keep the aquasoil in the tank for the benefit of the plants inside and out. It seems like these bumbles can handle it just fine and seem happy eating their blood worms and hanging out on plants and on the sides of the tank, with their normal bursts of swimming. In fact I just love these guys and they even seemed to swim their way into my net when I was moving them, like they new they were going to a better place. Well it's better than my little quarantine tank they were in. I also had a lovely surprise today in my community shrimp tank. I have neo's and cardinia's, oto's and endlers in there. My endlers have had a few babies here and there in the past few weeks, but when I looked today I have about 80 new babies, so I might have to use the hospital tank as a grow out tank, as I still have two females about to pop soon, so will clean it totally out and try to raise the ph up for them. The shrimp community sits at about 6.8, so might try some shell grit in there, as there is no aquasoil, but I think it was sitting so low, as I had a sick tetra in there prior to the bumble bees and I would have used half RO and half tap to get a lower ph. I also noticed two of my female cardinia berried shrimp are missing in the plants, so might mean I'm going to get some babies from them too. My neo's constantly pop out babies and I sell them all the time, so it would be nice to get some cardinia's too.
LR, I got the tank to settle at a ph of 6.8 and the bumble bees are doing way better in that. The rams are starting to spawn now too. The male keeps displaying and the female's stomach is going bright pink. They seem to like it under the tree stump, where there is a little cave area and the male is constantly digging in there. The kohli loaches are digging holes everywhere and they seem to love to love it under the rocks and I don't know if this is normal, but they seemed to have made a nest under some rocks against the glass and only two of them go in there and they seem to stop the others from entering. Not sure how bumble bee's mate, but some seem to have teamed up. So, everything is great. It's way better than having the sphagnum and aquasoil in there, but my bad as I always kept things that liked it acidic. But all species seem happy in 6.8 close to neutral water. Figured out if I mix 2/5ths of RO with 3/5ths of our overly alkaline tap water plus a couple of caps of Prime, I get 6.8 to 7. Since I have to cart my RO in for my shrimp, this will also save my back a bit. Thanks for your advice and it did point me in the right direction.
Hard to tell without water readings such as TDS or gh/kh and ph. Maybe start with a little and see what it does. Its hard to sustain if you do water changes you may need to refreshen the sphagnum all depends on your water. It will also break down over time.
Leave it in so it seeps like a tea bag. After awhile it will break down sometimes it causes algae sometimes it doesnt. You can watch it as it browns and turns to decay you can choose to replace and refresh or just keep refreshing.
It’s usually best used only for selective breeding projects since it can be inconsistent but if you do use it just watch for how it breaks down since the break down of it will vary from conditions of your water and aquarium.
Has anyone ever tried grape or bay leaves for tannins? Would they also lower pH. I have access to both and maybe I'll put some in a jar and see what happens. My water hovers around 8 pH. I have switched to distilled water that is at 7.0 instead of using my filtered tap water. But, it is just not coming down. I'm about ready to tear the tank apart and start over. So far my Betta and otocinclus are not having any problems with this high pH environment. I want to add some shrimp though and they cannot handle it at all. Oh, I'm doing this in a tiny 1 gallon planted tank that has a filter and heater. I loosely followed the Father Fish method to set it up.
Grape would work better than bay imo. The breaking down of dry leaves cause the tannins and acidity that can eat away mineralization which would alter the hardness but all dependent on how acidic it gets.
L.R.Bretz's Aquatics i checked the ph 24 hours later and I still don’t see any change but my test strips only go up to 8.4 so that kinda worries me because I just added quite a bit of acid to the water and don’t see a significant change. 7 teaspoons of 5% distilled vinegar to 10 gallons of water. So now I’m wondering how far above 8.4 my water actually is.
You can leave it in but does get more acidic as time goes as it breaks down. If trying to get a desired acidity best to mix in bucket or something and keep it they way. That way you can mix and dilute as you need without any worry and more consistent stability.
Hello I watched this video . Do you think it’s possible to breed L333 yellow king tiger plecos in a consistent ph of 8. From what I’m seeing it’s 6.5 to7.5 not sure if you have any experience with plecos? Any additional info would be much appreciated! Thx👍
Ph drops can trigger breeding then with a cold water change. So if you have them in your water you have now at 8 then drop to 6.5 for a month then slowly raise then repeat when wanting to breed. Should get them to trigger. Hope this helps and thanks for subscribing!
It should be fine. Does your ph lower after awhile? Hydrogen molecules will give you a high ph then when out gasses it lowers ph. Should be fine either way. Just make sure theres not any big swings on it and also give time changing the water after you feed. If you do it to fast it will bloat them after feeding. Ive kept discus in harder water 300 ppm 8.6 ph
Hello!! I came across your video because I am struggling to lower the pH and KH in my tanks. I naturally have hard water where I live, and I have tried the chemicals to help the pH, I have moss balls and drift wood in my tanks. The water readings I’m getting wont budge. So my pH has been at 8.4 ; KH at 300 and GH at 300. I am going to order the moss you talked about. And with that I am curious, because my levels are so high, will it end up lowing the pH too much where my fish die!? I have a betta, 4 neons and and bristle pleco in a 10 gal. I am cycling a new 10 gallon for my betta because he has fin rot and even with medication he isn’t healing. A woman at petsmart told me it could be due to too many fish in my tank. Any help and info would be so very much appreciated!!! Thank you, God Bless.
Hi! I see you wrote this 2 years ago, but I just read it and I’m having the same problem (with the Ph and the Betta). Could you be so kind to tell me how you fixed it? Thanks!!
I need some advice. I have a 60 gallon tank with 4 electric tetras, 7 guppies, a small catfish about 1 1/2”, and (2) small angel fish about 2” long. My ph is super high definitely over 8 and I’ve been fighting this for about a week. I have a 10 gallon tank my fish were in before which the ph was always high in that tank also. My tap water the ph is over 8. I’m trying to use my 10 gallon to prepare some water for my 60 gallon for when I need to clean. I need to probably get my ph in the 10 gal to about 6 so when I add my tap water hopefully it will balance out to about 7 if I do a 20-30% water change. I have driftwood in my 60 gal and some moss I’m not sure what type. I need some advice on preparing my 10 gal tank to achieve a ph of 6. If you can provide some info or links I’d really appreciate it. God bless
L.R.Bretz's Aquatics yeah my ph is definitely above 8 but what worries me is my test strips don’t go any higher so I don’t know how far above 8 my ph is. My kh is maxed out also showing 300. My nitrate levels are very low close to 0. Water hardness is 25. Chlorine is 0. I’m new to aquariums and this is the first time I’ve heard of tds. So I’ll start doing some more research on tds. So far my fish seem to be doing great healthwise. All very active and eating well. None of them are secluding themselves. I have a topfin 75 gal hang on back filter with carbon filters and I made a homemade bio media filter using a 1 liter sports bottle. Drilled some holes in the bottom and left the cap off the top and shoved my air pump hose in the bottom so it fills up with water and the air bubbles go up thru the media and out the top. I filled a media bag about the size you used on this video with the forest moss and I have a small piece of driftwood about an 1 1/4” diameter and about 15” long. My gravel is about 1 1/2” deep. No plants a few decorations. Any suggestions?
What’s a good way to keep ph around 7 with RO water ? Can using any of these things help keep It stable ? Trying to keep my TDS around 250 got it around high 300 right now
Depends on hardness of water. Harder it is the longer it takes acidity to break down the mineralization. Also the amount in. Eventually it does lose its potency after it decays more.
what was the ph before the moss? i have 8ph and want it to be 7. i accedentaly put crushed shell sand in there becouse it didnt say on the bag and now im trying everything. ph down with water changes just ait cutting it on this one
Its should drop it quite a bit, now if it will go as far as 6.5 depends on how much you put in it and how high your KH is becuase its harder to change or will need more moss the higher your KH. I got mine from ebay, its fairly cheap. Heres a trick on how to grow it easily yourself as well: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-BShjARwk7Qw.html
You can scrunch them into a ball but they wont live underwater forever and grow but they do last forever and so does the effect of lowering the ph with its acidity from decaying.
Can I put a bag of Spaghnum Moss in my HOB filter to get the PH down? My black neon tetras are dying one by one. At first I thought it was neon tetra disease. But now I suspect it's my well water. My PH is 8.1
You can but I have been breeding my black neons in hard water with a higher ph than that. What happens with new tetras from the store is they may come from acidic waters but need to transition from the acidic water to akaline slowly. The reason is there immunities. In acidic water it is really hard for bacterials, viruses, fungus and other stuff to live but in akaline water it i more abundant so there skin coat needs to develop more to protect them which takes a small slow gradual transition phase. Hope this helps.
I can, Ive never used it but could imagine it may get all over the place and be food for algae faster. But I could be wrong. You can find live sphagnum on ebay. At least during warmer months I dont know about in the winter...
@@timf8449 Hi Tim! I was curious about your experiment. Did it work? I'm trying to lower my pH (8.0) and I tried everything and I like the idea of the spaghnum moss
