Pick fish for your water

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How do I choose which fish to buy?

Pick fish for your water

Pick fish for your water. Select fish who are native to waters having a similar chemical properties (pH and GH) to your local tap water. If you have hard water, choose hard water fish. If you have soft water, choose soft water fish. This is especially important if you water is outside the 6.5-7.5 pH range. Changing the natural hardness (or pH) of your tap water can be hard work and often takes the fun out of keeping aquariums. Moreover, bungled attempts at adjustment are common and often worse for fish than the original sub-optimal water conditions. A good way to learn which fish live happily in your local water is to check with a local fish store.

   

Comments

3/2/2007 8:55:31 AM
Russ said:

Excellent advise. I think its worse to dump chemicals into a tank than to leave the current settings (PH and Hardness)alone and work with it. If you can find fish that work with your water parameters, great. However, if you're not satisfied with the fish that match your parameters, there are more natural ways to adjust your PH and water hardness without using chemicals. I believe this to be more of a gradual change as well. You could use peat moss, driftwood, or other vegitation to lower a PH and coral, limestone, cuttlebone, shells, cichlid substrate, or baking soda to raise the PH and harden the water.




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