Hard Water / Lenny
Hmmmmm… I’m worried about the P.P. Since you soaked the wood for 30 minutes and just “rinsed it well afterwards”, it could still leach P.P. into your tank. Remember that since it soaked for 30 minutes, the porous wood should have sucked up some of the P.P… probably not enough to be a major concern since P.P. is actually used as a fish med but in the future, if you soak something for 30 minutes in a disinfectant chemical, then flush it for an hour or more… or even soak it overnight in fresh water, changing the water often. I wonder if the P.P. could be the reason for a higher GH reading (P.P. is a salt) and even reduction of nitrates due to it’s oxidation properties? Maybe someone else will have experienced this before..
I know PimaFix doesn’t change water chemistry test results and the driftwood, if it starts leaching tannins… and just generally over time as it slowly decays, will slowly lower the pH and KH levels as part of the overall ecology but as long as you keep up with your weekly PWC’s, driftwood should not cause any problems. I have two nice pieces in my goldfish tank but I have harder water than you, so it’s never been much of an issue for me.
This article http://discusrebels.com/Articles/PP.htm says that Hydrogen Peroxide or most dechlors will neutralize P.P. and that P.P. will kill the nitrifying bacteria so you might want to re-dose your tank with your dechlor just to be safe and test your ammonia, nitrites and nitrates daily before doing any PWC’s to see how the nitrogen cycle is doing.
I’m guessing you are NOT running carbon right now since you are using medications…. right?
Lenny Vasbinder Fish Blog - http://GoldLenny.blogspot.com (Links to any articles referenced in above reply are listed on the right side, alphabetically under Labels and also under Archives by Year, Month)
Category: Philippines Internet Koi Society
