# High KH should I worry or is it ok



## stuuts (Aug 2, 2010)

I have extremely high KH in my tank but everything else seems to be about right. Is that possible? Can someone look over the info and tell me what they think.

MY TANK:
55g long
lighting- 4X 32w T-8 flour.
1X aqua-glo 18,000K
1X sun-glo 4,200K 
2X 6,500K 
heavily planted with all sorts of things I don't know the names for

pH- 7.2
KH- higher than I can measure(over 240 ppm)
GH- ~40
NO2- 0
NO3- ~0
CO2- 2X DIY (I don't have any way to check actual lvls in the tank)

I use flourish excel and some generic fert(just ran out and threw the bottle away) 

Fish: 3 platy
2 khuli loaches
20+ common guppies? Bought some feeder fish when I cycled my tank when I set it up
these things breed like crazy- I give a bunch of em back to lfs about once
a month 


Plants are growing well.
fish are doing well. 
algae is doing not so well as of late.

I've had a planted tank now for about 2 yrs but until recently I've never worried about the 
right way to do it I've just sorta winged it. Overall things have worked out ok but I've 
had some problems with algae. Just recently I went on vacation and when I got home the 
tank was so full of algae that I decided to empty out all the plants and start over. 
Since then I've been reading up alot on the proper way to care for my tank and the 
"right way' is alot more complicated than I ever would have guessed. I must really have 
lucked out to have as few problems as I did. I attached a picture of my tank in case that helps.


----------



## flashbang009 (Aug 6, 2009)

Your tank looks pretty darn good for just wingin it! Anyways, your high KH isn't all that uncommon. Do you have naturally hard water out of the tap? If so, its then just a matter of how the fish and plants are doing. Research what kind of water your fish like to see if your hard water will be a problem. If it is coming out of the tap that hard, you can try to soften it, but otherwise don't worry about it.


----------



## stuuts (Aug 2, 2010)

Thanks for the reply.



> Do you have naturally hard water out of the tap?


yeah my water comes out of the tap VERY hard. I add alot of RO water to try to compensate.
The plants I used to have and the fish I still have don't seem to mind it too much but some plants I've had in the past just seem to wither and die, don't know if its water, lighting or something else. I've tried repeatedly to keep some ghost shrimp but they only last a few days at best, again not sure why.



> Your tank looks pretty darn good for just wingin it!


Thanks on the complement on the tank but remember I just had to replant the whole thing(its been up about 2 months). Anybody can plant a good tank-the challenge is getting it to stand the test of time (but I do think I've done pretty good so far)


----------



## flashbang009 (Aug 6, 2009)

The ghost shrimp problem may just be fish eating them. Do you see dead shrimp or do they disappear?

Sounds like you've made the best of your water situation though. At this point i wouldn't worry to much about the high kh


----------

