Re: [Killietalk] carbonates (probably)

[Wright Huntley <whuntley at inkmkr_com>]

Edd Kray wrote:
> I'm looking for some advice from you chemists out there.
>   

As a chemist, I'm a pretty good electrical engineer. :-)

> Now my questions:
>  
> 1)       Anyone have any real info on the effect of hardness on fish,
> ovaries and, especially eggs. ( I see lots of eggs go bad here). If you
> have a technical reference, I'd love to access it.
>  
> 2)       How about a refresher on the "Barry Cooper" water treatment
> method. How much HCl do you add and how do you know how much is enough?
>  
> Of course, the good news here is that whatever is buffering this water,
> it never goes acid on me like my old water supply would. It just stays
> at pH 8 for months.

My memory is that Barry's water is very different from yours. His is 
very lightly buffered high by silicates and has very, very low GH, I 
think. His big solution was to get the essential electrolytes the fish 
need back up with some Seachem "Equilibrium."

Mine is similar to his (runoff from snow, mostly over granite) but I 
have higher GH than he does, so it isn't so dramatic as his. Mine is 
still weakly buffered high by silicates (9 or 10 or so before 
atmospheric CO2 brings it down to 8 or the high 7s). Then it stays 
fairly stable because my GH and KH are both up around 4 degrees and the 
KH provides pretty good buffering. It is around 60 ppm as CaCO3, of 
which a good 0.3+ ppm is iron. The plants love it! Overall tds runs 
85-90 ppm.

I do add "Equilibrium" to any of my hard-water-loving fish. I also add 
some boric acid to the desert pupfishes, which usually helps them produce.

High GH (8 or10+ degrees) seems to make eggs of rainforest species have 
trouble hatching. It acts about like adding too much dye and the chorion 
seems to get too tough to be broken down by the hatch enzymes. I have 
never seen sound documentation of this, but it is common mythology that 
seems to hold sorta true. IDK what effect it has on the ovaries, because 
my fish simply won't let me fool with them.

> In balmy, sunny, 65 degree Colorado...(I know, wait until next week)

Missing the end of the Dallas/Rams game, because the wet, sticky snow 
has covered my dish. Just wait a couple of days and it will get there.


Wright

-- 
Wright Huntley - Rt. 001 Box K36, Bishop CA 93514 - whuntley at verizon_net 
- 760 872-3995 760 874-2000 (CA) or 941 866-0500 (FL).

“A journey of a thousand miles starts with an airline ticket.
Unless you’re crazy” -- Chad Carter.

http://www.self-gov.org/wspq.html


Join the AKA at http://aka.org/modules/tinycontent0/index.php?id=9
Archives are at http://fins.actwin.com/killietalk/
Modify your subscription at http://www.actwin.com/mailman/listinfo.cgi/killietalk