What's up with my PH?

I'm doing a fish-in cycle with my betta (he moved from his horrible bowl-I thought putting him in ASAP would still be better than the bowl). Its been a couple of weeks and the cycle is doing very well. I tested my water yesterday and found that Everything is at 0 including Nitrates and they should be building up soon enough. So I'm not worried about the cycle. I, however, have a PH of 8.2. This is very high and will make the nitrite spike more toxic. However, is this PH hurting my fish? If so, how do I lower it without too many products. Thank you.

 

I would test your source water ph first so you know where you are starting from. The reason for this is because substrate and decorations can raise or lower ph. If you have gravel that can raise your tap water ph considerably. I suffered from this in the past and had to change to silica sand which is inert.

You can use the vinegar test on any rocks or gravel, remove some and put some vinegar on. If it fizzes then it will raise the ph in your tank.

If the source water has a high ph then you will either need to use chemical products or try bog wood which naturally lowers the ph.

Also peat in a filter works to soften water

 

I would test your source water ph first so you know where you are starting from. The reason for this is because substrate and decorations can raise or lower ph. If you have gravel that can raise your tap water ph considerably. I suffered from this in the past and had to change to silica sand which is inert.

You can use the vinegar test on any rocks or gravel, remove some and put some vinegar on. If it fizzes then it will raise the ph in your tank.

If the source water has a high ph then you will either need to use chemical products or try bog wood which naturally lowers the ph.

Good idea, it must be the source. It's bare bottom for now. Well it has a couple of marbles from the bowl that he rests on but it doesn't cover much.

Also peat in a filter works to soften water

Okay. Will the PH hurt him?

 

Even with a pH at 8.2, your betta would be fine. I'd only worry about a fluctuating pH. My pH is at 8.0 and none of my fish have issues.

 

Even with a pH at 8.2, your betta would be fine. I'd only worry about a fluctuating pH. My pH is at 8.0 and none of my fish have issues.

In a couple of weeks, once my tank is fully cycled, he will be getting only weekly 25% water changes so his PH won't go anywhere much. Okay, that's a relief. Thank you!

Oh, by the way, HI again el337!

 

My understanding is that betta's prefer ph7 to 6.8 soft water. I have read the most important thing is stable ph.

 

Hi!

 

My understanding is that betta's prefer ph7 to 6.8 soft water. I have read the most important thing is stable ph.

Yeah I have seen that the ideal PH is about 7.6 because they like only a little acid. But its hard to control everything with such frequent water changes! Right now, since his water is at an almost perfect level with everything else, I'm not doing changes to prevent fluctuations. However, when the parameters spike for the last time, I will be doing a lot of changes to keep the levels acceptable. The nice part about this guy is that he has such a great personality that he plays withy hand and my cup during water changes. So he is really hard to stress out. Just a couple of more weeks, and he'll have a happy and healthy home forever! That is until he dies. Which if that happens I'l probably cry. I'm getting too attached to him. He was in Petsmart for about a week when I got him a month and half ago. He is now fully grown and still pretty small but how old do you think he is?

 

I am not sure how old he is but depending on the type he can be anything from 2.5cm to 12cm in length.

 

I am not sure how old he is but depending on the type he can be anything from 2.5cm to 12cm in length.

12cm, Jeez! He's a veil tail and he was in a small area for a while. So I think he's stuck at 2.5 cm. But he likes squeezing into small areas he shouldn't be in like behind the filter so I guess that's okay.