Tap Water Rant

[aarhud]

Hey all,

I have known for some time that I need to move over to RO water or rain water. Either option is not easy to implement in my current small home.

My tap water is great out the majority of the time. I can do water changes and see the fish benefit (increased activity, spawning, etc). But eventually, I do a water change and not long after the fish are visibly uncomfortable. I lose any fry in the tank. I lose a pencilfish or two, while the rest of the Pencils take on lighter coloring. The Apistogramma take on stress coloration.

Do you think the Waste Water Treatment plant is "flushing" the water with something? I would say this happens once a month in summer and more often during the winter.

I treat the water with prime. So in theory, chloramine and chlorine should be taken care of. I suppose chloramine could be a problem due to the ammonia released. But testing the tap water always shows a small ammonia reading. Nothing new.

I live in a small house. I do not have a place to setup RO and a storage vessel at the moment. Not to mention my water is expensive, $60 a month is the lowest amount I pay. The price easily jumps up closer to $100 when I use more for gardening, filling outdoor ponds, etc.

I am going to try to do three times a week 20% water changes instead of one or two larger changes. Any other suggestions are greatly appreciated.

 

[Mike Wise]

Sorry to read of your water problems. Just one question. Do you aerate your water before adding to the tank? I guess it's possible that sometimes the water directly from the tap is low in O2. I guess ammonia could be a problem. Not all NH3 tests are the same. Some measure all ammonia, some only free ammonia. I'd expect a functioning biological filter would take care of any ammonia in the tank fairly quickly. One other thing. Unless your tanks are horribly over-stocked or you are forcing fry to grow faster I see no need to change more than 25% of the water every 1 or 2 weeks.

 

[aarhud]

I do not aerate. I could start that by either adding an attachment to my hose or trying to age the water. Ill have to see if I can find a spot for 20-30g water tote. Do you think that would alleviate the problem?

I can scale back on water changes. Im guilty of just wanting to work in the tanks since I only have three now.

My tanks are all under-stocked at the moment. The big tank only hosts a pair of A. baenschi and a few fry that I could not catch. Along with 15 pencilfish.

The 10g I lost the group of fry in only held the female and her 2 week old fry.


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[Mike Wise]

I've used 20 gallon size plastic storage bins to treat water in the past. They don't take up much space and can be adapted to treat water with peat relatively easily.

 

[gerald]

I use a rubbermaid 32-gal trash can to age and aerate tap water - its only 17 in diameter across the base and 22 in diam across the top. Mike's correct that tap water can be low in O2, especially in summer - that might be an issue. Hopefully your tap water comes from a Potable Water Treatment Plant, not a Wastewater Treatment Plant. Are you on the Rock Hill SC water system? Also is your "hose" polyethylene tubing (e.g. Python material) or a garden hose? If using a garden hose, let the water run through it for a few minutes before running it into your barrel or tanks. The plasticizer chemicals in garden hoses can be toxic, so you need to flush out any water that's been sitting inside the hose.

 

[aarhud]

I use a rubbermaid 32-gal trash can to age and aerate tap water - its only 17 in diameter across the base and 22 in diam across the top. Mike's correct that tap water can be low in O2, especially in summer - that might be an issue. Hopefully your tap water comes from a Potable Water Treatment Plant, not a Wastewater Treatment Plant. Are you on the Rock Hill SC water system? Also is your "hose" polyethylene tubing (e.g. Python material) or a garden hose? If using a garden hose, let the water run through it for a few minutes before running it into your barrel or tanks. The plasticizer chemicals in garden hoses can be toxic, so you need to flush out any water that's been sitting inside the hose.

I remember the brutes from my saltwater days. Do you have any idea how long the water should be aged? If the problem was with O2, I think the water would saturate fairly quickly if I use a spray nozzle to fill and an air stone to circulate the water in the tub.

I hope my drinking water comes from a potable water plant as well! . I'm on Lancaster City water. I am using a RV hose to fill. I empty the water from it after each fill. The hose says it is safe for drinking water.

 

[aarhud]

I have moved over to aging water for 24 hours. Too soon to tell, but so far no issues with water changes.

 

[themountain]

Thats the way to do. Here ein Lima I filter the water first through a carbon filter and then it goes into a "peatcannon"

...result is constant water with Ph 6.4 and 80 ppm hardness from 7.7Ph and 250-400 ppm.

 

[aarhud]

I like the Peat Cannon!

I created something similar, but I doubt I have the capacity you do. Do you fill the whole length of tube with peat? I am using a 5 gallon water bottle with the bottom cut off and inverted. Imagine a 5 gallon funnel. My water pump recirculates the water through the inverted water bottle. I am experimenting with the amount of peat. On my current batch, the water as has been recirculating for 48 hours and has a light yellow color.

 

[themountain]

That 5 g bottle will do just fine
Mine is filled to 2/3 with peat...when I fill a 10litre bucket in it it needs approximately 5minutes to run through. I use sfagnum peat I buy at a local garden shop.

 

[gerald]

Peat quality varies a LOT depending on the local conditions where the Sphagnum moss grew, died, and became "peat" before it was mined. Some batches may be more acidic and have greater ion-exchange capacity than others. A lot of the peat sold in USA is harvested from Canadian peat bogs. Where does the peat sold in Peru come from? Is it labelled on the bags?

 

[themountain]

No, its not labeled and I have no clue where its from. My guess is its from Ayacucho
...but its cheap and has a Ph from around 5

 

[Kaliska]

Depending on your water source rain levels will impact the water. Winter especially in cold climates because there is no fresh rainwater going in. PH and hardness can change as well as trapped gas. Also sometimes the city will switch water sources in the middle of the summer due to low water conditions and they may be very different. Sometimes they will also flush the lines with higher levels of chloramine and trapped gas than usual. That's just normal stuff and people have sudden die offs from tapwater all the time. Now when your water tests 5ppm ammonia consistently, you spend 6months trying to run denitrification, and you can't even get rid of it all with an ro filter that has a DI canister (requiring monthly changes) so you buy special carbon and put on 2 exchange resin canisters just to get the ammonia low enough you can cycle it in a storage container before using and not spike the nitrates noticeably then we can talk about tapwater rants.

 

[Phile]

If your tank is heavily planted and lightly stocked with fish, you shouldn't need such large water changes. I get RO water from my local Meijer grocery store, filled into my own 1 gal jugs, for $0.39 a gallon ( more if you use their jugs). It's supposed to be drinking water, but you really shouldn't drink RO water in large amounts or it will screw up your own osmotic balance. For my single 20 gal planted tank, I top off as needed and change 10% every couple of weeks. Plants are growing rapidly with Seachem Flourish, Exel, and Potassium. Fish are providing the nitrates, no charge.

 

[Kaliska]

I've actually planted to the point of having to add nitrates. Co2 system and rows of cf bulbs. My tanks aren't that far setup yet this time. RO from the grocery store is still 2 ppm ammonia minimum here.

 

[Phile]

Then you may just be shocking the fish with too many and too large water changes. If you have to add nitrate, the system is taking care of itself. People often forget that plants provide a large surface area for deaminating bacteria, just like live rock in a reef tank. This is especially true if the plants were purchased out of tanks that also had fish.

 

[Kaliska]

Not sure who you are talking to. On tanks I added nitrates I wouldn't do water changes for months.

 

[aarhud]

I wanted to update. Since aging my water and doing smaller more frequent water changes, the issues have cleared up. The fish look a lot better as well.