when I did the water change the PH was around 6.5 after it was 7.5 normally the PH after the water change is only 7.1
What is your PH
- Thread starter thefredpit
- Start date
Drstrangeloves comments and the thread for ref. His comments were in reference to a comment made about ph swings.
I can personally attest to point #1. After a wc ph in any tank ive ever had was always lower right before my next wc. Tannins from dw will lower it as well. I stopped testing ph for yrs now. Moved from NYC city water to DE well water and the fish didnt bat an eye. Ive never kept sensative/delicate fish though
His comments :
"Im not sure where you read that, but people who say that are routinely debunked:
1) Almost everyone's pH changes, sometimes dramatically, when they do a water change. It's unavoidable since pH will change between water changes and in fact changes every 24 hour cycle. Just bringing a fish home will often subject it to a large pH swing. If huge pH changes harmed fish, it would be commonly known by the millions of people who do water changes.
2) Published experiments have been done (using multiple species of fish) testing reactions to being moved from one pH level to another that's dramatically different (e.g., differences of 9 to 6, or 5.5 to 8.5) and fish weren't harmed. Even instantaneous changes do not harm fish.
3) Innumerable species have been found to have the ability to live in a wide ranges of pH (from as low as 4.5 to as high as over 10) without being harmed.
4) Otoh, I've not seen a single study where healthy fish were taken from one pH level and placed into another one, where any harm was shown to have been been given to the fish. This would of course be a remarkably easy and inexpensive test. Companies that make products that adjust pH would certainly want people to believe their product would genuinely fix a serious problem. So, why no studies?
5) This myth likely comes from the fact that fish sometimes die after a large water change because the owner forgot to dechlorinate the water properly or introduced some inadvertent poison into the water (e.g., hand lotion or skin cream.) They then are told (without evidence) that "pH changes" led to the deaths. This is then repeated over and over as if it's true.
The cause of an otherwise uninjured fish dying is (in most cases) largely conjecture without an autopsy. Were it only so that we could determine cause of death sans any evidence whatsoever.
Different pH levels will affect eggs and fry, and perhaps inhibit breeding. It can inhibit BB and perhaps affect diseases or healing. It may even have long term health effects. But juvenile to adult fish rarely if ever seem to be affected by "sudden" pH swings in any range (5-9) that an aquarium would normally be found."
I can personally attest to point #1. After a wc ph in any tank ive ever had was always lower right before my next wc. Tannins from dw will lower it as well. I stopped testing ph for yrs now. Moved from NYC city water to DE well water and the fish didnt bat an eye. Ive never kept sensative/delicate fish though
His comments :
"Im not sure where you read that, but people who say that are routinely debunked:
1) Almost everyone's pH changes, sometimes dramatically, when they do a water change. It's unavoidable since pH will change between water changes and in fact changes every 24 hour cycle. Just bringing a fish home will often subject it to a large pH swing. If huge pH changes harmed fish, it would be commonly known by the millions of people who do water changes.
2) Published experiments have been done (using multiple species of fish) testing reactions to being moved from one pH level to another that's dramatically different (e.g., differences of 9 to 6, or 5.5 to 8.5) and fish weren't harmed. Even instantaneous changes do not harm fish.
3) Innumerable species have been found to have the ability to live in a wide ranges of pH (from as low as 4.5 to as high as over 10) without being harmed.
4) Otoh, I've not seen a single study where healthy fish were taken from one pH level and placed into another one, where any harm was shown to have been been given to the fish. This would of course be a remarkably easy and inexpensive test. Companies that make products that adjust pH would certainly want people to believe their product would genuinely fix a serious problem. So, why no studies?
5) This myth likely comes from the fact that fish sometimes die after a large water change because the owner forgot to dechlorinate the water properly or introduced some inadvertent poison into the water (e.g., hand lotion or skin cream.) They then are told (without evidence) that "pH changes" led to the deaths. This is then repeated over and over as if it's true.
The cause of an otherwise uninjured fish dying is (in most cases) largely conjecture without an autopsy. Were it only so that we could determine cause of death sans any evidence whatsoever.
Different pH levels will affect eggs and fry, and perhaps inhibit breeding. It can inhibit BB and perhaps affect diseases or healing. It may even have long term health effects. But juvenile to adult fish rarely if ever seem to be affected by "sudden" pH swings in any range (5-9) that an aquarium would normally be found."
well that leads me to believe the elephant nose died from 1 of 2 reasons
1. trauma from one of the larger bichirs or plecos(neither was happy about water level)
2. temp shock because it was directly under the water stream while I was adjusting it(most likely)
1. trauma from one of the larger bichirs or plecos(neither was happy about water level)
2. temp shock because it was directly under the water stream while I was adjusting it(most likely)
You notice any injuries ?
I might have this backwards but i believe ph is a big concern when ammonia is present. Im peetty sure the higher the ph the more toxic the ammonia becomes...or something like that
I didn't notice injuries but the injuries I'm thinking of are blunt force trauma because of the mass difference between the small 5" elephant nose and one of my 12" bichirs or plecos
it was still pretty young they get up to 12" and can live up to 10 years however they are so delicate they are used by water departments in both the US and Germany to test water quality
a great read and very informative. Thanks for sharing.
POINT #5. = yesss. I dont know why they tell us that pH causes the death of our fish. I've been told that way too many times in the past!~
point #2 is interesting and I wish it was elaborated on more! Although, I'm guessing it was summarized for the sake of the post.
I'm guessing in the studies, pH was the only variable that changed, while temperature, ammonia, other parameters were held constant for the other tanks.....otherwise the experiments would either lack validity or reliability. The other thing I thought was interesting is what does "the fish were not harmed" mean? Does that mean not die or not stressed? It would be interesting to see what qualifies that statement and how they measured it. Also does instantaneous mean from one tank to another or a pH change in the same body of water. So many open questions! Woo science!
Either way I am going to keep doing my slow drip acclimation for pH and temperature when introducing new fish
unrelated, but it makes me feel like it causes the fish less stress. Anyhow, it is great to know that pH swing in an established tank is a normal thing and doesn't cause fish deaths directly. I had no idea it could fluctuate that much! Fish are so cool.
