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Cardinals with EI + hard water

madlan

Member
Joined
29 Sep 2010
Messages
241
Location
Stevenage, Hertfordshire
Hi all,

What would your opinion be regarding keeping soft water fish (e.g large shoal of Cardinals) in an EI fertilised aquarium with hard water? I’m worried about large water changes changing any adjusted water parameters?

I have a 50gpd RO unit but 50% water changes once a week make it impractical to use, I was hoping to use just straight tap water. What about adding peat or other chemicals to the filter? I guess each week the 50% water change is going to raise the hardness for several days until the peat etc softens the water again, not ideal!

My tap water is:
pH 7.2
GH 340 mg/L (ppm)
KH 260 mg/L (ppm)
 
Hi,
You need to stop worrying about hard water and just get on with it. Unless you are trying to breed cardinals there is little to no effect. Changing your water will keep your tank clean. You have a personal guarantee from me that keeping your water clean is 100X more important to cardinals than keeping it soft.

Cheers,
 
Hi Clive,

I was ready to roll with EI + 50% tap water changes but I have a large shoal of wild cardinals available that I'd love to keep in this large aquarium (323 litres). From Google research it seems they can suffer a premature death due to calcium deposits in their kidneys? I think my GH is pushing it slightly for them no?
I don’t intend on breeding them though – do you think a few weeks acclimatisation from an RO\tap mix to just tap water would help?

The other option would be a method that requires less water changes, PMDD for example?

Thanks
 
Hi Madlan,
I don't have my water stats but I'm in Welwyn Garden City so I suspect my tap water parameters would be similar. I got 12 Cardinals about 18 months back. I don't use EI (yet) but do 40-50% water changes per week anyway on a 160L. I've lost 2 in that time due to whitespot, other than that they look perfectly healthy.

Cheers.
 
Are all cardinals wild? I have 10 in a 240l and dose ei with 50% wc every week with heated tap water. Some of my fish are a few years old. I'm in London sw17 so would say you are fine. but I don't know if wild cards are different to what's in the LFS?
 
Hi Madlan
I live in Hemel.
Ive had cardinals for years......there's in no problem with hard water as Ceg said clean water is the priority and that's correct.
Soft water is probably needed for breeding purposes only.
Just make sure the water is approx the same temperature as the aquarium water when doing changes.
Cheers
hoggie
 
I live in London where the water is almost pure rock.

I dose EI and do two 50% water changes a week, use tap water straight from the garden hose, and got about 20 cardinals for just over a year without issues.


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Exactly. The majority of cardinals found in LFS are wild caught but they are also being bred quite regularly. For best breeding success soft acidic water is the way to go, no doubt. For general keeping, as indicated by the other posters, hardness is much less relevant. The fish are sensitive to water quality, but water quality means "clean", with low NH4/NO2 which are very toxic. In all fishkeeping literature you'll see that NO3 takes a beating, but as with the other posters, my cardinals, as well as my other characins and dwarf chiclids live for years in my GH 25+, heavily dosed tank. Organic waste buildup is what kills fish, because the primary product of it's breakdown is NH4=>NO2 which does the damage, not only due to direct toxicity, but also to the fact that it robs the water column of Oxygen in order to be broken down on it's way to becoming NO3. At the end of the day, NO3 is simply the smoking gun.

If the fish do suffer from kidney stones, then that would be a pathological mechanism due to diet, illness and so forth, not due to Calcium transfer from the water.

It doesn't really matter whether you dose PMDD or EI. You still need clean water and that is best achieved by changing as much water as possible and as often as possible. RO water won't save you if it gets dirty.

Cheers,
 
The aquarium is just over 300 litres and filtered by a Fluval FX5 loaded with ceramic media, combined with 50% weekly water changes I don't think water quality should be much of an issue if I keep the stocking density low.

Thanks all!
 
Nearly all literature, with respect to cardinal tetra's suggest soft acidic water, and a bit warmer than what many other tetra's enjoy. Not sure why anyone who researches fishes before purchasing would consider placing these particular fishes in hard alkaline water or any other softwater species for that matter,Yet many do so.
What is the logic? A few generations removed from the wild does not, has not, in my expierience (many other's) make these fishes more adaptable to hard alkaline water.
Most expierienced hobbyist's would suggest that soft water species will fair better longer,in soft water and hard water fishes, will fair better in more alkaline water if it is the longterm health of the fishes that are of primary concern.
Have followed this principal for 40 years and it has served me and scores of other's well.
Just my two cent's.
 
Hi Madlan

my water has gH > 20 and kH > 15. I have Cardinals for last 3+ years. I do a 50-70 % WC every week, straight from the tap. I have never had any problems with them either, nor do they get any shock/dullness after WC. Even their luster/radiance doesnt shrink (if thats a measure of their uneasiness!) either.

My lfs told me that these guys can survive typically abt 5 years or so.. So in lack of any controlled experiment to isolate the kidney issues, I wouldnt jump to conclusions about water hardness as the sole culprit. The lfs guys also told me that Cardinals are a wee bit sensitive than other tetras (or thats what they learnt before joining the profession), but in their experience never had this problem as well.. The daily CO2 injection periods lead to pH swings as well (on a smoother timescales though), but these also fail to affect my cardinals' behaviours. I wont worry about this.
My 1 1/2 cents :)
 
roadmaster said:
Nearly all literature, with respect to cardinal tetra's suggest soft acidic water, and a bit warmer than what many other tetra's enjoy. Not sure why anyone who researches fishes before purchasing would consider placing these particular fishes in hard alkaline water or any other soft water species for that matter,Yet many do so.
Yes and if you research carefully, you'll find that nearly all literature suggest that nutrients cause algae. If you buy a dropchecker made by reputable manufacturers, the literature that comes with it suggests that you fill the checker with tank water. These are all wrong, as we ourselves have proven, and this also means that hobbyist literature is subject to revision.

First of all, in order for the literature to be valid, it's suggestions must at least match the empirical data from hobbyists - and it simply isn't the case, as demonstrated by the hobbyists that have posted. How long do your soft water fish live in your soft water tank? Have you actually set up multiple tanks side-by-side to test your conviction? Second of all, just about all the non-Rift Valley fishes soled in LFS are soft water species and it would not be pragmatic for everyone to use RO units to accommodate these fish. The empirical evidence shows quite clearly that dirty water kills more fish by a huge margin than any faults due to water hardness.

It's easy to regurgitate what we have been fed in The Matrix because this is how we are programmed. How does the literature explain the success of those keeping soft water fish in hard water? Does the literature actually explain the mechanics of the effects of hard water on soft water fish? I never see an explanation of this in any of the hobby literature. They only ever issue forth dogma, and like lemmings, everyone simply follows the lead, and that's why there are so many problems keeping healthy tanks, because The Matrix trains everyone from birth to focus on the wrong things and to ignore the most important things.

Cheers,
 
I believe there is enough evidence from my expieriences, as well as forums littered with those who have been largely unsuccessful with keeping fishes that thrive in soft water in hard alkaline conditions,,,that one cannot easily dismiss suggested water parameter's.
I can wear shoes that are too small for my feet,but am much more comfortable when wearing shoes that fit properly.
Would agree that more fishes are killed by poor water conditions than nearly all other factors combined, but why court unnecessary problems ?
I would no more suggest to new hobbyist's that cardinal tetra's would be fine in hard alkaline water, than I would suggest Tanganyikan Featherfins, shellies, or the common mollie would be suited for soft acidic condition's .
The majority of them won't in my humble opinion.
 
Anecdotes aren't evidence, although they can give us a good indication of what we should be testing. How would you isolate the different factors to determine it's harder water that causes problems?
 
Isn't easier to blame EI for everything? :D

Why deduce?
Why really know?

hehe...........

Come on, it just feels right. :lol:


regards,
Tom Barr
 
plantbrain said:
Isn't easier to blame EI for everything? :D

Why deduce?
Why really know?

hehe...........

Come on, it just feels right. :lol:


regards,
Tom Barr



No, I am not attempting to place blame ,Merely suggesting that if one chooses to place soft water fishes in hard alkaline water(not sure why one would) and the fishes do poorly,, I might consider cutting the source water with Filtered rainwater,distilled water,or R/O water and then see if fishes fair better.
I use a modified version of EI in a low tech ,low light tank with numerous fishes, and they actually try to eat the dry fertz when I am too lazy to mix them with some water.(have not seen any deaths from this or sick fishes)
Other than GH booster ,or Seachem's Equillibrium,I'm not sure dry salts,fertz, NPK, do anything to increase Hardness or create softer more acidic condition's so much as they increase Conductivity TDS ?
 
Hi roadmaster

a question indicating my naivity: when you say fish "fair better" or "do poorly", how do you "measure" or "know" this? And against what criteria/benchmarks do you "calibrate" this and/or isolate the water hardness as THE issue?

I have cardinals and platys & mollis all in the same tank (kH > 15, gH > 20), all are sufficiently fed to keep them a wee bit hungry and they always smile & pose nicely for my camera action ;) . But I would be really interested to know if I am being cruel in putting cardinals in hard water. of course if the water is too hard (dip the finger for a minute & its gets white by deposits) then surely theres an issue at hand :)
 
plantbrain said:
Isn't easier to blame EI for everything? :D

Why deduce?
Why really know?

hehe...........

Come on, it just feels right. :lol:


regards,
Tom Barr

There is no way that EI can cause any bad effects on fish, on the contrary. Something very similar to EI is used by homeopaths, they call it tissue salts, and this people. Go to holland and Barrett and ask for it.

My wife has been using tissue salts, and some o her family in south Africa , for a long time now, way before I knew what was EI.

I am sure that soon we can say, for example as I cannot prove it, that I fish have dull colours dose this, are old dose that, etc.

I will look for a chart about tissue salts and post here.
http://www.alternativevet.org/tissue_salts.htm



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