# Is it possible to have too high of PH ??



## Cannuck (Jan 4, 2009)

Hello everyone, 
And hats off to this forum, great questions and great responces

I will be a rookie with Cychlids

I am new with this and planning to exchange my tropical and getting African Cichilds very shortly, I am doing my homeworks at this time. 
I have a 72 gallon Bowfront tank.
I am on well water and my PH is extremly high meaning off the chart high, higher than 8.6 but yet my tropicals are striving, my Nitrite is lower than 0.1 and my Amonia is 0.1 and yet I still have no stones or rocks that would raise the PH even higher
My question is,,,,, 
Is it possible to have too high of a PH, ?????

Any help would be appreciated
Thanks


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

of course it's possible to have a pH that is too high... for many species at least. 
Caustic water would be too high! 

That doesn't mean your tank water is though... are you sure you can rely on that reading?


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## Cannuck (Jan 4, 2009)

Thanks for the fast responce,

I will double check it at my local fish store just to make sure.


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## cevvin (May 2, 2008)

My ph of the water, drops slightly. If your using liquid reagent tests, try this. Get a bucket, fill it with tap water, test the ph, then in 24 hours test the ph again. You might find that it drops on its own.


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## PeterUK (Sep 16, 2008)

cevvin said:


> My ph of the water, drops slightly. If your using liquid reagent tests, try this. Get a bucket, fill it with tap water, test the ph, then in 24 hours test the ph again. You might find that it drops on its own.


This is a good test but personly I would use a clean glass bottle as is totally inert, also I would aerate it for the 24-hours as well.
I would definately double check the water as it is quite rare for water to be that hard ! ! !
Are you using a liquid test kit or the dry paper strips ?


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

PeterUK said:


> I would definately double check the water as it is quite rare for water to be that hard ! ! !


 I don't think you mean hard... pH and hardness are not directly related.


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## PeterUK (Sep 16, 2008)

opps me bad 

Minutes ago i was reading about a species of rainbow fish that lives in a lake where the electric conductivity is only 145 ÂµS, with a total hardness of 5Â°GH (about 90ppm), the pH of the water is around 9. So the water is rather soft with a high pH.

I should have been more precise :thumb:


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## boredatwork (Sep 14, 2007)

If it really is 8.6 I wouldn't consider that too high. But I would do the bucket test mentioned above. The reason is that if you have a low KH with such a high pH, you can have a very large pH swing which is potentially dangerous. Also, a lot of times with a pH reading that high it is not very accurate for a variety of reasons - the bucket test will help give you the real number.

As already mentioned a pH can be too high, but it is unlikely that it would be "too high" out of the tap. Anything above 9.0 would be somewhat strange. As for what too high can mean, ammonia has a pH of 11. You definitely don't want to have ammonia coming out of your tap. But at 8.6 you would be OK with most Africans, certainly with Tanganyikans who can easily handle up to 9.0.

But at the same time higher pH values carry potential problems. One of the most important is that ammonia toxicity increases exponentially with higher pH value. An 8.6 would be considered a high value. So it is very important to make sure your ammonia is always 0 whenever you have fish in the tank.


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## Cannuck (Jan 4, 2009)

I want to thank everyone for their great responce, I have tested my water at Big Als who is the closest to me and was also free  My ph was at 8.8 I guess I will try to bring it down a bit.

Thanks again
Serge


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## boredatwork (Sep 14, 2007)

Cannuck said:


> I want to thank everyone for their great responce, I have tested my water at Big Als who is the closest to me and was also free  My ph was at 8.8 I guess I will try to bring it down a bit.
> 
> Thanks again
> Serge


Why do you want to bring it down? In most cases it is preferred not to adjust the pH. Especially if you want to lower it.

Before doing anything I recommend you measure the KH of your water.


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