How long does it take to regulate pH levels?

Question

I have a fairly new tank and I was given the testing drops for pH. No color chart or instructions though. I assume blue is bad and I am supposed to aim for sea green color on the pH test.

How I did test was 3-5 drops in the vial with the water, is that the right amount of drops? Do I have to let it sit 5 minutes like the other tests? It is still blue after putting as much of the powder in the tank that is supposed to fix the pH yesterday. Do I have to wait longer than a day? It is not in the instructions.

I have everything else under control and have the complete kits, just the pH thing is giving me grief. So any help would be great. Thanks!

Answer 1

You need a pH test kit with the comparison charts so you know exactly what your pH is. One way to stabilize pH is to add a little bit of crushed coral or crushed shell to your gravel. This will increase the hardness in the aquarium slightly but will lock the pH at a solid 7.0. As long as the fish you have don't require soft/acidic water it's a reliable way to stabilize your pH reading.

Answer 2

Wait wait here.  You don't have an actual reading, just a color chart but doesn't give you a reading?  Well before anyone starts jumping into shifting the PH they should have mentioned a few things.

"It is still blue after putting as much of the powder in the tank that is supposed to fix the pH yesterday"

Miss, PLEASE, just stop doing this now.  What I want to mention here first, understand this.  PH (Potential of Hydrogen) is measured on a logarithmic scale.  This means, shifting from a factor of say 8 to 7 would seem like a good thing, but it's also water that is now ten times less basic then what they just were in.  Consider that impact on the nervous system of your fish.  These PH up and down chemicals just radially and rapidly impact your PH like that, and the results are your fish going into shock.

Secondly, what goes hand in hand with your PH is your hardness reading.  Think of hardness as the back up buddy that helps keep a PH at what it is.  This is how you want to shift and adjust your PH.  Find a testing kit first, that gives you a numerical reading on your PH, and follow that up with a tester that will provide you with both a GH and KH reading (General Hardness, Calcium hardness)  You'll want to know what these are before adjusting a PH.

Look, many companies will sell products that you don't really need, nor do they care about the impact of what their products do.  Most PH up and down stuff, don't address the real issue in the hardness, and you see the PH bounce back to what it was before anyways, making that c**p worthless.  PH's are generally best adjusted prior to populating with fish, but in this case, if you really need to change it, we must know what your hardness readings are first.

Answer 3

what IS your natural pH? messing with the pH is actually really really inadvisable. a fluctuating pH is more likely to kill off fish than a stable one.

if you pH is over 8.2 or under 6.5 then you will have to address it and stock with fish only suitable for that, but if it's between those numbers, there's no need to mess with it, doing so will cause more harm than good.

Answer 4

pretty much all fish will be ok with ph level of most tap water , its best just to let it be