Hi, I'm wondering which is better to maintain PH levels in a tank. My tank's PH is worse than the financial markets in terms of flunctuations. Eg. Day 1, fresh water change, PH at 7.6, day 2 declined to 6.8 and at day 3, the tank is now a killing field with PH at 5.7 I bought PH raise from Fritz, but figured that it's not a long term solution. My PH crashed in such a terrible manner that my lionhead suffered terribly, there's red streaks on it's tails and fins, right eye has haze. Drooped fins and tails, and 'body' is flaking bits and pieces of skin and there are holes all over it's once beautiful tail.

Have moved the fish to a hospital tank doing 80% water change daily. And monitoring the params, no medication is used. My problem is the PH in the main tank. I realised that PH will decline when my Eheim 2026 filter is turned on, strange but true.

I'm thinking of getting coral chips, which is available in the lfs in Singapore, so far, called many aquariums and all just asked me what is "crushed corals" which means that it's not available here.

Could anyone advise me if coral chips are as good as crushed corals and how it's to be used.

Thanks

Maybe they're the same, but with different packaging.

I would think that they are the same thing, just given a different name. (And even if they are a bit different, I wouldn't expect it to be by much--like, it's possible that the "chips" aren't quite as small as the "crushed"--and they probably both would do as well with pH changes.)

When I added crushed coral to my filter, I bought a couple of filter media bags from one of my lfs, and filled them to an inch or so from the top with the coral. Then I tied them closed, and rinsed them really well to wash out any little bits. Then I just popped them into one of the levels in my filter.

The results have been fantastic! Within 2 or 3 days my pH (which was always low) had neutralized and stayed that way. It's been at least a couple of months, or more, since I added the coral, and it was only with last weekend's water-testing that I found the pH level beginning to drop again. So this weekend I'm going to replace the bags. ^^

Good luck!

I prefer Eco-complete~subtrate~

I use coral chips.They maintain pH well also I don't have to top it up as frequently as you would have to with the crushed coral.