WATER PARAMETERS

WHAT IS IT AND WHY DO PLANTS NEED IT?

Since we are trying to keep plants and animals happy and thriving in our tanks, we need to make sure our water chemistry is in line with what makes them happy! We simply cannot just toss plants, fish and/or shrimp in our tank and expect them to thrive. We really need to be looking at what is in our water. Here are the main things we look for in water chemistry.

GH – GH or General Hardness is a measurement of calcium and magnesium in your water. Ideal water parameters for a planted tank are around 4º for GH (which is considered “soft water”).
KH – KH or Carbonate Hardness is the measurement of (bi) carbonate ions in a solution. Again, Ideal water parameters are around 4º for KH.
pH – pH is the concentration measurement of hydrogen ions in a solution. But no sweat if you can’t remember what you learned back in chemistry 101, all you really need to know is there is an ideal range of pH that supports life. If you are getting your GH and KH levels where they need to be for the livestock and plants you are keeping, the PH will naturally follow. So there is no need to sweat about PH.

Plants and livestock like all of these parameters to remain steady within a certain range. Large fluctuations in GH, KH and PH can negatively impact the your tank, so we need to try and keep these parameters as stable as possible. Some other honorable mentions that are talked more in detail in the cycling section of our website are organics. They include:

Ammonia - This is produced by our fish's waste, rotting organic matter in the tank, and even our tap water at times. Ammonia is toxic at around .25ppm, so this is why its important to cycle a tank WITHOUT fish in it before introducing them into the tank.
Nitrites - are slightly less toxic to fish than ammonia, but still toxic at around .5ppms.
Nitrates - This is the end of the nitrogen cycle and is also a macronutrient. We don't want zero nitrates, but we need to monitor nitrates to make sure they don't get out of control, and are in a specific ratio with phosphates.
Phosphates - Sometimes phosphates can present themselves in our tap water. It is fine in small quantities as its a macro nutrient. But we need to be mindful of them as they can cause hair algae issues like filamential algae, and BBA.

Aagin, if you'd like to learn more about organics on our tanks, check out the cycling section of our website. This article is going to focus more on how to test and adjust our waters GH/KH/PH.

TESTING OUR WATER

The trap a lot of hobbyists fall into is that they hear others say "I use my tap water and my tank is just fine" and assume their tap water is the same. While this can be true for some, not all "tap water" is the same. Some tap water is from our city's municipal supply, while others have access to well water. Furthermore, not everyone's city tap is the same. When I lived in Long Beach CA, my GH was 28, and my KH was 24 with no organics in my water. I moved over one county, and now have a GH of 7, and KH of 7, but also have phosphates in my water. So we can't rely on others to figure out what is in our tap water.

What we suggest you do is test your taps water chemistry and figure out what you are dealing with first. There are ways to to scrub your water with something like an RODI system, but we always suggest one to try and make their tap water work first, and their tap water isn't manageable, then move to an RODI system which we'll talk about later. API sells a GH/KH test kit. This is a great little tool for getting an idea of where your GH/KH are. This kit measure hardness in degrees. Each drop of the reagent in the kit equals one degree. So if it takes 12 drops to go from yellow to green with the GH reagent, we now we are at 12 degrees of hardness. Same with the KH but it goes from blue to yellow. The video at the top of this page explains all of this in great detail.

Furthermore, the PH test kit is very simple. We simply add 3 drop of the reganet in our test vial and let it sit for a bit. Then we can use the card that comes with the kit to tell what our PH is. Easy peasy.

WHAT DOES THIS ALL MEAN?

Most plant dominated tanks will thrive at a GH/KH of around 4 degrees. The further away we get from this target, the harder and hard it is for plants to thrive. We believe it has something to do with nutrient uptake, but has not been able to find a study on why. Now if your tap water is within single digit degrees, so between 4-9 degrees in hardness, and free of organics like ammonia and phosphates, we advise you use your tap water to keep water changes super simple. However, the further into double digits we get, 10+ degrees or harder, the more your plants are going to struggle and we would suggest using remineralized RODI water for water changes. This will give us full control over our water chemistry. If you water's hardness is less than 4 degrees, then we suggest you add some minerals to help boost the GH/KH up to 4 degrees. Overall its less work to raise your GH/KH than it is to lower it.

HOW TO DEAL WITH HARD WATER

If you water is in the double digits in degrees, so 10+ degrees or harder then we suggest you use an RODI. RODI units remove everything out of yoru water creating pure H2O. The simplest and most cost effective RODI unit we've found is a RO Buddy by AquatiLife. This little unit can be ran off a sink faucet, shower head, even a hose spigot. It does not need to be preminalty installed which makes it great for renters. Shoot, we used to remove the head off our kitchen sink, attach the unit to that and make RODI water in our kitchen. We have used this little unit for years and would highly recommend it.

However, we can't just use pure H2O as our plants and fish need minerals to survive, so we need to remineralize the RODI water. We do this using Seachem Equilibrium to boost our GH and sodium bicarbonate, which is just baking soda, to boost our KH. We love Seachem Equilibrium because it has extra potassium and iron in it as well which your plants will love! And most households have baking soda lying around, which makes it very cheap and accessible for everyone. There are fancy procuts like Seachem Alkaline Buffer, but those are sodium bicarbonate based so you're just buying fancy baking soda in a bottle.

But making your own water and having complete control over your water chemistry is literally this easy. We add enough of both Equilibrium and baking soda to boost our RODI water from zero degrees on both, up to a GH/KH to 4 degrees. Now (bi)carbonates (KH) effects PH, so at a KH of 4 degrees, our PH will sit around 6.8-7.0 which is a very neutral PH. And BAM! You have perfect water every time.

To boost your GH up to 4 degrees, we use 1 tsp of Seachem Equilibrium for every 5 gallons of RODI water.

To boost your KH up to 4 degrees, we use 1/4tsp of baking soda for every 5 gallons of RODI water. Here are some additional calculations that might help you increase your KH with baking soda:

5 GAL + 10 Grams = 17dKH
10 GAL + 10 Grams = 8.5dKH
20 GAL + 10 Grams = 4.25dKH
50 GAL + 10 Grams = 1.7dKH

THE DOWNSIDE OF A RODI UNIT

Overall, using an RODI system just add more time and cost to water changes. If we are not consistent with water changes, organics will build up in our causing imbalances and algae. So the more sustainable we can make water changes, the more successful you are going to be in the hobby.

The big issue most have with RODI water is that you have to make the water ahead of time. Depending on the size of your aquarium, this can take a few hours. You also need to store this water before putting it into your aquarium which can take up a nice amount of space which some might not have. For a 30g aquarium we use a 10g trash can with a float value attached to it to shut off the production of RODI water when the trash can fills up. This allows us to walk away and prevents the trash can from overflowing. Then we use a small pump and fill up 5 gallon jugs to carry to our aquascape. As you can see, this process can make water changes more difficult, causing us to not process them weekly.

Furthermore, we have to service the RODI unit once in a while. That means every 12-24 months we need to replace the carbon/sediment cartridges or the RO membrane, or replace the DI resin. This costs money over time. We will say that having a RODI unit is a LOT cheaper than buying RODI water from your local aquarium store, or buying distilled water from a grocery store, but there is still a cost involved.

However, we will end this section with RODI water is going to give you the best results as it is the great equalizer. It is said that if you prepare a meal with poor ingredients, you're going to a poor tasting meal. Our results with our aquascapes are only going to be as good as the water we put in it. There is not going to be anything more pure than remineralized RODI water, but it comes at the cost or more time, money, and work. So just be prepared for that prior to getting a unti.

HOW TO DEAL WITH SOFT WATER

I first start off by saying you won the lottery. Most of us aquarists spend a lot of time and money to get soft water and you have it out of your tap! The only thing you need to do is add minerals in to get either/both of your GH/KH up to 4 degrees. As stated above, you can use Seachem Equilibrium to boost your GH and sodium bicarbonate, which is just baking soda, to boost our KH. We suggest Seachem Equilibrium because it has extra potassium and iron in it as well which your plants will love. And most households have baking soda lying around, which makes it very cheap and accessible for everyone. There are fancy procuts like Seachem Alkaline Buffer, but those are sodium bicarbonate based so you're just buying fancy baking soda in a bottle.

As stated above, to boost your GH up to 4 degrees, we use 1 tsp of Seachem Equilibrium for every 5 gallons of RODI water.

To boost your KH up to 4 degrees, we use 1/4tsp of baking soda for every 5 gallons of RODI water. Here are some additional calculations that might help you increase your KH with baking soda:

5 GAL + 10 Grams = 17dKH
10 GAL + 10 Grams = 8.5dKH
20 GAL + 10 Grams = 4.25dKH
50 GAL + 10 Grams = 1.7dKH

PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS IF YOU HAVE SOFT WATER!!! If you have soft water and want to add more mineralize for something like neocaradina shrimp, DO NOT USE CALCIUM CARBONATE PRODUCTS to achieve this. Calcium carbonate products consist of:

Argonite
Cuttlebone
Wondershell
Crushed Coral

We wrote an article on this in which you can read, but essentially calcium carbonate products jack up your GH and KH uncontrollably until your PH reached 7.8-8.0. Uncontrollable processes are the opposite of what we want in our tanks. We can complete complete control over our tank GH/KH/PH at all times. You can read the full article here - Should I Use Cuttlebone For My Snails In My Aquarium?

(BI)CARBONATES EFFECT ON PH

A lot of hobbyis ask, how to reduce their PH and the answer is simple. Reduce your KH or (bi)carbonates. If you lower you KH, you will lower your PH and the reverse, if you raise your KH you raise your PH. Its that simple. When adding (bi)carbonates to your tank to raise KH, know that bicarbonates will have less of an effect on your PH than carbonates. For example, if you use sodium bicarbonate, baking soda, to raise your KH, it will have less of an effect on your PH than sodium carbonate, which is soda as. Just something to keep in mind. Most aquascapes will do fine with sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) and there is no need to use a carbonate. If your PH is too high, test your KH and you'll see that will be elevated as well past 4 degrees of hardness.

SOMETIMES your PH can be artificially high. This means you have a low KH, but a high PH. To fix this you can use white vinegar. You can use .5ml per gallon to drop your PH down to where it should be based on your KH. Example. if you have a 10 gallon aquarium with a PH of 8.0, but a KH of 4, we would call this artificially elevated. You would use 5ml of vinegar to drop the PH down to a 7.0 where it wants to be. Just make sure to add the vinegar slowly as to not have any ill effects on your livestock.

ADJUSTMENTS FOR A PLANTED SHRIMP TANK

For the most part, shrimp and plants have competing goals. The three biggest things that stand out are water parameters, water changes, and nutrients:

Water Parameters: Depending on the shrimp you get, like neocaridina shrimp, they could require harder water parameters above what plants prefer. What we suggest is to simply match the breeder's GH/KH. This will ensure that the shrimp have an ok time transitioning into your tank, and the plant will adjust. Just know that there will be a transition time for the plants as they get used to the new GH/KH. If you have caradina shrimp, they are happy with a GH/KH of 4, which the plants will also love, but you'll need to reduce feralization and water changes as described below.

Feralization: Normally if you are using the ASG Feralization kit and were injecting CO2, we'd suggest dosing 1ml per gallon, but with shrimp we suggest to cut it down to 25% of the dose, so .25mls per gallon which is the dosage you'd use if you were not injecting CO2. Slowing down the feralization will also slow down growth of the plants, but help keep the compounds from building up causing poor water quality for the more sensitive shrimp.

Water Changes: Shrimp just don't like water changes. Straight up. However, we need to process them for two reasons in a planted tank. 1) so that nutrients doesn't build up. And 2) To help replace essential minerals like calcium. We suggest processing a 20% water change weekly instead of the 50% weekly water change we suggest. Cutting back on the fertilizer will help us reduce the amount of water we change with no i'll effects on the tank.

If you'd like to read more about our experience with neocaridina in a CO2 injected planted shrimp, you can check out our article named Neocaridina Shrimp in Planted Aquariums.