Black Water Questions And Observation

Over the years I have kept banded sunfish in many different types of tanks. I even had one in a community style tropical tank when I was young. They are bullet proof fish that absorb all sorts of abuse, eat flake food readily and live for years in a halfway decent tank. I only have one complaint - they look so beautiful in the net when you catch them but no sign of that beauty is ever seen again once they go into my tanks. I've always known it was my water which is moderately hard and has a pH kept in the high 7 range by the water department [corrosion control]. The buffer capacity of the hardness makes it difficult to lower the pH effectively. I also am vehemently anti-chemical, especially the snake oil pushed at the LFS so I won't go to heroic effort to modify my water parameters.
Recently I decided to try a different approach. I grabbed some tea colored water from a brook which feeds the mill pond where I get my bandeds and filled my tank and let it settle and equalize temp before adding the sunnies. It worked like a charm! For the first time ever, I had banded sunnies that stayed colored! A check with my digital pH meter read 6.30, lower than I've ever had in any tank. Also the water had that nice reddish tannin color.
Then I added an old fashioned corner box filter [I still use them and love them ]. Normally I modify a powerhead to run them but didn't want so much current in this tank. Instead I used an airstone. After 3 days, all my sunnies were the washed out silvery greyish color I'm so familiar with. A check of the pH read 7.3. It occured to me that I had raised the pH by vigorously aerating the water which drove off CO2. I should have thought of that since my real job is in water treatment. Also I've long known not to use aeration in planted tanks for the sake of keeping the CO2 for the plants.
So that's my observation FWIW. Keep it in mind when trying maintain low pH tanks.
Now the questions;
I'm interested to hear what NATURAL methods people have had LONGTERM success with so called "blackwater". I know some of you guys are doing it cause I know you keep blackbanded sunnies. I'm not gonna go buy any chemicals at the pet store so don't bother with that suggestion.
I have unlimited access to distilled water so I think I'm gonna start there. What I need is suggestion on ways to add the tannins and also trace elements etc that are essential that will be missing from the distilled H2O. I know about peat moss but have never used it. Other ideas I've had are oak leaves and acorns. I also saw someone mention balsam cones. Having seen the beautiful red water in the NC sandhills I'm also curious about pine straw.
Anybody???

I don't know about a natural way besides continuing to get water from that source (which may only be tannic right now due to leaf fall).

An unnatural way that mimics nature is to use RO water (which will get the hardness way down) and then adding discus conditioners that you can get at the LFS. I've been doing this with my Gulf Drainage tank and I can't believe how great the fish look. But you start playing chemist this way. If you're not opposed to that, this is a nice way to care for these species.

Todd

Add dead leaves. Decaying leaves are what causes blackwater conditions, and also lowers the pH. Oak leaves are a good choice, and they add a more natural look to you r aquarium.

Add dead leaves. Decaying leaves are what causes blackwater conditions, and also lowers the pH. Oak leaves are a good choice, and they add a more natural look to you r aquarium.

Check this out. Click "How to Build a Moss Wall"

http://www.aquamoss.com/

I did this and also added waterlogged sticks and leaves and misc detritus. The effect was good moss growth and a whole lot of inverts (mainly small shrimp and tiny Odonata larvae) that persisted and were slowly eaten by the fish through the mesh. I have intended to pack a big fat pouch like this with sphagnum, sticks, leaves and balsalm fronds etc. and utilize it to lower my water's pH, just haven't gotton around to trying it out yet. You could also try getting some sphagnum and putting that in your corner box filter instead, or put it in the mesh sach as described above. My water is really hard also, and our new house doesn't have gutters (yet) so capturing enough rainwater for my tanks would not be easy right now.

If one could get the proper assemblage to lower pH, stain the water and sustain an invert colony within the safety of the netting that would be pretty cool.

I don't know about a natural way besides continuing to get water from that source (which may only be tannic right now due to leaf fall).

An unnatural way that mimics nature is to use RO water (which will get the hardness way down) and then adding discus conditioners that you can get at the LFS. I've been doing this with my Gulf Drainage tank and I can't believe how great the fish look. But you start playing chemist this way. If you're not opposed to that, this is a nice way to care for these species.

Todd

OK, I guess using distilled h2o isn't exactly natural. Mainly I wanted to avoid bottled chemicals, much of which I believe either does harm or nothing at all. I am open to experiences of others, as long as it make good sense.
RO water would be better than distilled, I think, because it wouldn't be completely devoid of trace elements and other constituents that might be critical. I don't have an RO unit though, I've got a still. So I'm concerned that I might need to add more than just tannins.
Todd, do you know what exactly the discus conditioner contains?
Do you have a brand you recommend? PM if you don't want to give free advertising.

If you have a still, why not use 50/50 distilled/tap and add peat? You should have great results with that and it's repeatable.

Check this out. Click "How to Build a Moss Wall"

http://www.aquamoss.com/

I did this and also added waterlogged sticks and leaves and misc detritus. The effect was good moss growth and a whole lot of inverts (mainly small shrimp and tiny Odonata larvae) that persisted and were slowly eaten by the fish through the mesh. I have intended to pack a big fat pouch like this with sphagnum, sticks, leaves and balsalm fronds etc. and utilize it to lower my water's pH, just haven't gotton around to trying it out yet. You could also try getting some sphagnum and putting that in your corner box filter instead, or put it in the mesh sach as described above. My water is really hard also, and our new house doesn't have gutters (yet) so capturing enough rainwater for my tanks would not be easy right now.

If one could get the proper assemblage to lower pH, stain the water and sustain an invert colony within the safety of the netting that would be pretty cool.

How bout that, I'm a trend setter and I didn't know it!
I collected a big wad of moss and some oak leaves from the stream where the fish came from. Loads of critters came with it. I always like to add some live foods when acclimating new wild caught fish. That way they don't get thin if they don't take to frozen right away.
I like the look of the moss. The sunnies love it. You can't see 'em but there are 6 sunnies in this picture.
remains to be seen what effects the stuff has on my water chenistry,

Actually RO or Distillers will remove more than you want to loose. So I re-harden my water to the GH I would like with Kent RO/DI conditioner (just because that's what my LFS had). I looked at the Sera products too... But I didn't feel like handing over half my retirement for some carbonate and rattlesnake oil

You can do this by using a proportion of tap. My problem is, my tap is so friggin hard, that even a small proportion is too much. The proportion is somewhere between 6:1 and 20:1 lol. 6:1 was too danged hard, 20:1 and I lost my buffer in a week. And I don't have time right now to figure out if it's 10:1 or 15:1. And then, if I over do it again, then what do I have to account for when I do the next proportion left over that didn't turn into bicarbonate? Yeah. I spent $10, get 5 water changes for it, and I don't have to tinker.

I don't know what's in the products, probably some tannin extract with more rattlesnake oil. I think Ulands suggestion to use peat is the most sane and cost effective. In fact, I will give that a try once things settle down here over Christmas break.

Todd

If you have a still, why not use 50/50 distilled/tap and add peat? You should have great results with that and it's repeatable.

That's pretty much the plan I've come up with. It's definately easier than the other two options I thought of which were taking buckets of stream water or using water I pump out of one of the groundwater monitoring wells I sample every month at work.

mikez, if youre worried about color, why not try a different approach?

if you can, try feeding your fish live food a few times a week (daphnia magna,blood worms, ghost/brine shrimp)

also

mess around with the substrate, lighting, and background color of your aquarium.

a few small 10% water changes during the week might help too.
blackwater makes me think of Apistogramma, and Pterophyllum altum

Yah, I've done all that in the past. That's how I came to believe it's the water. None of those other things worked.

using water I pump out of one of the groundwater monitoring wells I sample every month at work.

you wouldn't want to use the water that comes out of our monitoring wells...unless you have fish that will flourish in NAPL and/or PCBs...

Excellent thread. I noticed a distinct change, not only in the color of my fish (native and tropical) and the health of my plants when I moved from the Syracuse City water suppy to Jamesville groundwater. Syracuse gets its water direct from Skaneateles lake. All they do is cholorinate. Needless to say the increased hardness and high iron made a very noticable difference. I shall continue to play , thanks for the info guys.

you wouldn't want to use the water that comes out of our monitoring wells...unless you have fish that will flourish in NAPL and/or PCBs..

Actually the point of monitoring the wells is to test it for contaminents. I know all the parameters. Although now that you mention it, we don't actually test for those you mentioned.
Oh well. I rejected that plan anyway. Probably a good thing.