Terrible Advice Tuesdays: The Ideal Water Parameters For Tangs
Terrible Advice Tuesdays: Tangs need a pH of 8.2 to thrive
The rest of the story: Somehow I suspect a sale of pH buffer accompanied this advice.
I pay little attention to pH. Why? Because unless it is below 7.6 or above 8.6, it really doesn’t matter what the pH of your tank is. Your corals might care and I can promise you your fish (even tangs) care less about pH. If you are chasing pH, then you’ve obviously fallen victim to this lie
Thanks Jeff for submitting this terrible advice.
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I have a client who fouls his tank so much with overfeeding that i kid you not when i say he has a not so reef tank thats normal ph bobs between 7.4 and 6.8 and the yellow tang he has still champs it out. I guess he lives off prayer alone i have no idea.
When I dose Dr. Tim’s Refresh/Waste Away, which can/will possibly affect PH levels, I just make sure before/after that I keep a proper/healthy KH reading, regardless of what PH levels may read out at. But yes, I admit I still check the PH, it’s hard to ignore 🙂
I had a PH meter and then the battery died…true story.
That’s funny Charles!
perhaps then the main reason for checking pH would be as “the canary in the coal mine”; an indicator of other things that may be going on which could have a deleterious effect on the tank. ie overfeeding, organic overload in sand, sump, refugium, dead livestock, and in my case caulerpa going sexual in the refugium dropping the pH from 8.4 to 7.8 literally overnight
One time at band camp, I stuck a ph probe in my tank. I used to worry about ph. I stressed over it. Thanks to Mark and a buddy I’ve learned not to be so OCD about it.
I agree with David regarding the “canary in the coal mine” mentality. In fact, I am not willing to ignore any parameter in my system, I just don’t freak out when something is off. I start looking for the cause of the potential problem.
Looking at the comments, some still don’t get it.
I only check ph when I’m trying to match my tank to my quarantine tank to add another fish.
My PH read 8.65 and I almost had a heart attack until I proceeded to test it with the seachem kit and found the probe was out of calibration. Don’t put all your faith in any one thing. Even controllers
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