How to treat high pH in an aquarium
What does it look like?
- Alkaline
- High pH test results pH above 8.5
- Invisible issue
What are the fish doing?
- Acting irritable - 'scratching', jumping, twitching, shimmying
- Breathing at the water's surface
- Fish appear pale or dark
- Flicking against objects
- Gasping, rapid gill movement
What should I do?
- Treat with Easy Adjust pH Down for Alkaline Aquariums to bring down the pH level
- Consider a water change if pH is particularly high
Why does this happen and how do I prevent it?
pH is a measure of whether water is acid, neutral or alkaline and is measured on a scale of 1 -7=acid 7=Neutral and 7- 14 =alkaline. Variances in pH can have dramatic affects on the health and wellbeing of your aquarium. Changes in pH are invisible so without regular testing changes can have an effect before you even notice something is wrong.
pH is measured in a logarithmic scale which means for every unit of change in the scale the concentration changes tenfold e.g. pH8 is 10x more alkaline than neutral pH7 and pH 9 is 1000x more alkaline than pH7. So relatively small changes in pH are actually quite significant.
In the aquarium natural processes constantly affect the water’s pH including:
- Carbon dioxide and nitrates which can lower the pH in your aquarium are absorbed by plants as food sources raising the overall pH
- Calcium rich rocks and gravel can also dissolve into water and raise pH
What treatment should I use?
Easy Adjust pH Down
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