Hi everyone,
I am new to ponds and fishes.....recently bought a house and it had a built in pond on the deck , 300 gallons...........now i am taking care of baby goldfishes.......i tested the water recently and found that the alkalinity shows high and the pH is 6.8.............i was wondering if the pH is right how did the alkalinity get high.......

am i missing something.......do i have to be worried according to the kit the alkalinity is showing at 300(kh)ppm........and it says high.....also i find some kind of froth at the edge of the pond(does not feel soapy) and also around the water lilly leaves........our pond has a fountain.

I have this kit called Jungle' s Quick Dip....5 tests in one strip (bought it in nnnnnn)

I am kind of worried as some of my fishes seem lethargic.......I just discovered that one of the has icks and he is swimming near the top and does not frighten easily as the rest..........i am going to get the icks medication right away.


please do help me with this.....

I'll try and help as much as I can. Please understand that I am just learning. From what I understand your alkalinity is fine and could be what is helping your fish hold on (maybe and I think?). I do not test for alkalinity.

Your ph in my opinion is getting too close to the danger zone. You need to up it fast. Put baking soda in and that will bring it up, that is if you have baking soda on hand. If not what would be better is crushed oyster shell or crushed coral. You can get this at a feed store as chicken feed they give it to the chicken so the egg shells will be harder. You should also be able to get it at any store that sales fish, some people like using it in the bottom of their salt water tanks. This stuff is great. You just put it in a bag and place it in your water fall so that the water is forced to go through it. If you place it in the bottom of your pond or anywhere which the water is not forced through it you are wasting your time. I put mine in a water plant pot, I'm sure you've seen them they sale them at home depot and they have tiny holes all around them. If your ph goes below 6 you have major problems and fish could start dieing. Your ph should be 7 or above.

About the ich, you should put salt in at a rate of .1% a day. So in three days you'll have .3% salt and this should solve your problem. You do not want to get regular table salt. You can get (and thanks for everyone on clearing this one up this last week) salt at Home Depot or someplace like that way cheaper than at the pet store. Just make sure it is 99.5 % pure non iodized salt! I am using water softener salt and it works fine. This is something I had just learned and believe me it will save you a bundle! You'll need 1 table spoon of salt per gallon. You need to be able to test your salt to make sure what you've got in your pond. It takes about an hour after you add the salt until it'll read accurately with your test. Remember, salt is great for a lot of different problems that may arise. You just don't want to keep your salt level at .3% all the time. Also, if you have plants you should remove them because this can kill some of them. It may take up to 4 days for the salt to rid the ich.

Read about salt for your pond.

You also need to do tests for Ammonia and Nitrites, both should be 0 at all times. Both, if the get too high, can kill your fish!

Good test kits;
http://www.pondrx.com/shop/details.php?pro...entId=4&catId=4

this is the one I use,

http://bonniesplants.com/my_store/master.jpg


You should probably read about Water Quality this is by Dr. Johnson and he is one of the leading Koi Vets in the United States.

I hope I've helped let us know how it goes? Also, take pictures so we can see your new pond .


Scott

If your test kits are accurate my guess would be you have too much organic decay in your pond. Even with high alkalinity reserves the muck in the pond is bringing the ph down.
One sign you pointed too was foam on the surface. These are DOC's. Short for dissolved organic carbons. This is a sign of a pond with a higher pollution rate.
I would try and vac out the bottom as carefully as you can without disturbing most of the sediment and then put in some conditioned( clorine or chloramine binder) tap water too replace what you removed. Around 30% of the water would be a good goal. If you can do this without disturbing the bottom too much I would guess that your ph will go up and stay there. If you want too keep it there you will have too do regular water changes but any pondkeeper should be doing these anyway.
This is also the reason why your fish has ich. Well, at least that is my guess.

Your title is a contradiction in itself.

pH is the measure of alkalinity or acidity.
below 7 on the pH scale indicates that your water is acidic, above 7 on the pH scale indicated alkaline water. 7 being neutral. There is NO OTHER measure of acidity or alkalinity.

So, if you say you pH is 6.8, it simply means your pond water is tending to the acidic side.

What you are calling 'alkalinity' is Carbonate hardness (usually indicated as kH). Carbonate hardness is the measure of the amount of buffering capacity in your water. The more the kH, the more it will resist a pH change in your water.

For goldfish ponds, a kH level of 300ppm is quite good. IMO it is better that the kH is high rather than low because if it is low, the pH can likely swing very quickly and cause a pH crash.

If this is too complicated to understand, the ideal readings for you pond is a pH of above 7 (7.4 being ideal), and a kH reading of between 300-350ppm. Try and achieve that and maintain it and everything will be good.

kev

Kev,
Why do you suggest a reading of 300-350 ppm for Kh?
Do you think the higher levels improves the fish overall for say show purposes. Better reds? Better blacks? Better whites? I don't know know the answer but I know it is suggested to keep koi in soft water for them too become their best.
I would think that most people will not see those readings out of their tap (at least here in the US). And even if it is much lower with regular water changes it will keep the Ph stable with lower stocking levels.
Thanks in advance for any replies.

Koivet.com talks about ph and alkalinity here;
http://koivet.com/html/articles/articles_d...Water%20Quality

From what I'm understand from the article the higher alkalinity helps keep the ph stable.

Scott

Jetman, having the kH reading at 300ppm has nothing to do with improving the colours. It it just as a precaution to stop the pH from sliding down very quickly and thus causing a pH crash.

It gives you some time to react. With very soft water, and a heavy load, and a filter that has been left too long, not maintained, the pH can crash very quickly (in a matter of hours), where as with kH readings of 300ppm, it will at least give you a days notice and some listless fish to react to b4 all22 breaks loose.

If anything, the saying goes that low pH promotes hi, and higher pH promotes better sumi....

kev

Kev thanks for the response.
The only reason I asked was because 300 ppm would be considered extremely high. I don't know why anyone would need these levels unless they totally neglected their pond.
I understand that a lower Ph promotes better hi and a higher Ph promotes better sumi but we are talking about Kh.
Why would you need a level over 150ppm too maintain PH if you did regular maintenance? I have also read that at levels this high the overall quality of the fish will suffer. I have only read this and since I am new pond keeper I don't have much on hand knowledge.
I know the japanese prefer softer water with a lower Ph and a good deal of water exchange when the fish are in the ponds. I think it is more about the overall luster and skin quality as compared too trying too bring out a certain color.
Any thoughts