Beginner - amanos and ottos water parameters

[Tjoste]

Hi!

New to the hobby, just sat up my 60p tank about 2 weeks ago.
Plants are green and grows nicely, but so are some green hairy algae that have started appearing.

Im planning to add some algae eaters next week when hopefully the ammonia and nitrite levels have gone down, so I started to do some research on amanos and ottos.
I tested both my tap water and aquarium water yesterday and it seems some parameters are off the recommended for these inverts.
Greenaqua writes the Otto needs water hardness of 15-20. Maybe its better to do amano and some snails?

Tap water (from water rapport)
PH: 7.7
GH: 1.7
KH: 1-2
Calcium: 10,6
Magnesium: 0.81

Aquarium yesterday
Temperature: 22c
PH: 6 (did a test while co2 had been running for some hours)
GH: 4
KH: 1-2

Im using the Ada amazonia 2 aquasoil, so im currently changing water every other day.
I have Seiryu stones in the tank, I guess its these that are increasing the GH?

Should I dose some GH and KH to get these higher?
Maybe the Seiryu stones will increase it enough when I stop water changing every other day?
Will it be a problem for the inverts if GH starts low when I just did water change (about 3GH today after 50+% WC) and it keeps increasing throughout the week?

I read this on another forum

If you have buffering substrate lowering the pH of the water, you are causing more harm by having the stone in the tank since it will exhaust the substrate, and would cause stress to any shrimp inhabitants.

Hope someone can help
Thank you!

 

[John q]

Hope someone can help

I'll try.

Personally I'd hold off adding the amano and ottolincus for at least another few weeks just to be sure any ammonia spikes have passed and will also also allow the tank to mature a bit, ottolincus shouldn't be added to immature tanks. You could add some snails in a week or two if you were desperate to add something.

Gh and kh would be fine for amano shrimp imo, I keep amano, ottolincus and snails in 1kh 2~3 gh and they're fine.
You might want to add a bit more magnesium if you're not already doing so with the fertiliser, 0.81ppm is a bit low, I'd probably add another 1.5ppm.

Can't comment on the seiryu stone, I've never used it.

 

[Hufsa]

Hello fellow Norwegian Welcome to UKAPS 🌿

Otos will do fine in soft water, no worries there Id be inclined to trust more in databases such as seriouslyfish.com and planetcatfish.com than Green Aqua.

I would not recommend you add otos so soon, they can be very weak when they arrive in the shops, and sometimes they can be difficult to feed. Some will only eat algae, and having a mature tank with no fluctuations is safer.

Keep in mind that just because someone on Youtube does it, doesnt automatically make it a good idea. I also suspect Green Aqua uses already seasoned filter media in their new setups, so that they may add fish quicker and therefore their "product" (the video) will be completed faster.

I think it is a better plan to add snails and amanos in two weeks, and then maybe otos 4-8 weeks from now, depending on how your tank is maturing. Its really hard when you start up, because you want everything to happen yesterday, but its not fun to have sick or dead fish, so patience is only a good thing.

Im gonna ping @Wookii who has more experience with naughty seiryu stones But I suspect you do not need to add more GH and KH aside from a little Magnesium

 

[MichaelJ]

Hi!

New to the hobby, just sat up my 60p tank about 2 weeks ago.
Plants are green and grows nicely, but so are some green hairy algae that have started appearing.

Im planning to add some algae eaters next week when hopefully the ammonia and nitrite levels have gone down, so I started to do some research on amanos and ottos.
I tested both my tap water and aquarium water yesterday and it seems some parameters are off the recommended for these inverts.
Greenaqua writes the Otto needs water hardness of 15-20. Maybe its better to do amano and some snails?

Tap water (from water rapport)
PH: 7.7
GH: 1.7
KH: 1-2
Calcium: 10,6
Magnesium: 0.81

Aquarium yesterday
Temperature: 22c
PH: 6 (did a test while co2 had been running for some hours)
GH: 4
KH: 1-2

Im using the Ada amazonia 2 aquasoil, so im currently changing water every other day.
I have Seiryu stones in the tank, I guess its these that are increasing the GH?

Should I dose some GH and KH to get these higher?
Maybe the Seiryu stones will increase it enough when I stop water changing every other day?
Will it be a problem for the inverts if GH starts low when I just did water change (about 3GH today after 50+% WC) and it keeps increasing throughout the week?

I read this on another forum


Hope someone can help
Thank you!

What @John q and @Hufsa said above. If your doing shrimps I would target at least 26 ppm of Ca and 8 ppm of Mg. Which would put your GH at ~5.5.

That said, Dragon stone are known to leach Calcium into the water column - I am not entirely sure if this is a short term phenomenon or something it will do for a long time..

Welcome to UKAPS!


Cheers,
Michael

 

[Wookii]

Im gonna ping @Wookii who has more experience with naughty seiryu stones

Yep, they are a no-go if you want to maintain a soft water tank. I had a load of it in my previous scape, and doing daily 10% water changes with pure RO water, the tank still had consistent values of KH 6 and GH11/12. I suspect though that was in part from the CaCO3 in the Seiryu stone being dissolved by the carbonic acid from the CO2, so if you're not injecting CO2, I'm not sure if it would happed to the same extent.

As mentioned above, if you want to keep shrimp, then you need around 5-6GH, with a good 3/4 of that being Ca.

 

[Tjoste]

Thanks everyone!
I will wait a few more weeks before I add any amanos or snails.
I read 0 or very low for nh4 today, but the no2 is still very high.

I do have some green hair algae that is growing alot, but my plants also looks very healthy, imo. So I dont know if I should do any adjustments, or this is just because of immature tank.

Anyways, thanks again for the suggestions!

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

I do have some green hair algae that is growing alot, but my plants also looks very healthy, imo

The green algae are <"very similar to the higher plants"> in their physiology and photo-systems, so conditions that favour plant growth will also favour green algae growth.

So I dont know if I should do any adjustments, or this is just because of immature tank.

As your tank grows in <"algae may decline">, but probably manual removal is your best bet at present, until you can add <"some tank janitors">.

cheers Darrel