Using bore water.

scozz

Hi all...

I have just moved house where all the water is from an underground bore and rain water collected from the roof.

Will this water be alright for the my tropical fish without having to add chemicals and water conditioner???

Thanks in advance.

fish_4_all

I would think that there is going to be a lot of stuff in the water that you won't want in your tank. Bird dropping, pesticides, outdoor plant fertilizers, roof treatment chemicals and other things.

I could be totally misunderstanding this though because I have I have not heard of the practice. I have used rain water in the past for my indoor plants when I could cleanly collect it but I really don't think it is good for the fish. If filtered someway then maybe.

scozz

Thanks for your reply...

Unfortunately i have no choice to use this water as its all is available.

I would like to know if there is something i can add to the water to condition it to make it safer.

I have used the water for the kids Goldfish and believe it or not the tank has never looked better and the fish seem to love it. Is this a good indication?

It is off the scale in alkalinity so i am controlling this.

I just wanted to make sure before using it for the tropicals?

fish_4_all

Well if it works for goldies then I don't see why not. I don't mean to pry but do you drink the water? Chances are that if it is your drinking water it will be fine for tropicals. Just make sure to take a little extra time to acclimate the fish to the tank water and they should do fine. Just try to match the pH, KH and GH as close as you can to the water from the LFS and they should be fine.

Lupin

It can be done. Do not collect the first water from the gutter as it may have washed away rat urine, bird droppings and any other unwanted things. If you live in the rural areas, the risk of contamination from pollutants is rather low. You will have to run the rainwater under filtration with carbon to remove any more unwanted things.

Urban areas may be out of the question as there are a lot of pollutants involved and the rainwater won't be safe for the fish anymore. Note that rainwater often lacks buffering capacity so you'll need to check your KH before using a CO2 unit. KH lower than 4.5 will simply risk your tank to pH crashes thus killing or harming the fish.

Goldfish are rather tolerant of most water conditions so I wouldn't assume straight away that your other fish will be fine. There are fish that you will need to avoid if you wish to use rainwater. Rift Valley cichlids in particularly have to be avoided unless you try to increase the KH and pH to certain levels that will allow them to thrive well.

musho3210

the safest thing to do is to buy an R/O filter, it removed 95-99% of impurities and makes the water pure. Once the water is pure you will need to add back in trace elements and proper buffering and ph control but this way you will know exactly whats in your tank since you are adding the stuff.

myuzicman

I've used this kind of water before. I let the tank cycle for awhile before adding fish. My alkalinity was off the charts too, so I controlled that also. I still added conditioner to the water just to be safe. I worked well.

daisycutter

the rainwater in my area comes with all manner of nasties thats what you get from living downwind of a cement factory but bore water is very pure as it is filtered through chalk but getting at it is beyond the means of the general public the alkali reading from this is off the charts problem is the water companies use these chalk aquifers as there main supply

hamdogg08

I think that an RO unit would help out a lot in your situation. Depending on where you live, there could be a lot of farm runoff. You could also have problems with whatever your well is dug into. I've heard that limestone does a number on aquarium water.

scozz

Thanks for your replys...

I'm a bit confused about what Kh testing is. If i remember back from school i think K meant Potassium!??.

Since the Akalinity is off the chart what is the best way to do water changes?
I was told that adding a heap of chemical to increase acidity at once can stress the fish.

Thanks again.