Water treatment aquarium: Above all, ornamental fish, shrimp and crabs need water to live. To ensure that you get the best water conditions, there are a few things to consider when treating the water. Water treatment is a topic that is often discussed, especially when it comes to additives. Water treatment has to be or doesn't have to be? What is involved in water treatment in the aquarium and is water treatment necessary at all? These questions and more can be found in the following guide to water treatment in the aquarium. However, we will only go into more detail here about the water in a freshwater tank. Saltwater pools are not treated.
Water is water
Surely the beginners will think that water treatment is not really necessary. However, this is usually not the case and the reasons for water treatment with special agents can be quite different. Water is ultimately a composition of many chemical substances. In addition to chlorine and copper, phosphorus and heavy metals can also be found in the water. Many of these substances are harmful to ornamental fish. It therefore makes sense to take a closer look at the topic of water treatment. But let's start with a look at the tap water, which is usually the basic material of our aquarium water.
How's the tap water? Isn't that clean?
This is exactly the question you should ask yourself. Before you know what the tap water is like that comes out of your tap at home, you don't have to worry about any water conditioners. The question of whether the water is clean or not makes little sense without a test. In addition, the term clean is actually not appropriate here. Basically, the composition changes. So it can be that water is rather hard, i.e. the total hardness GH is over 10 degrees, or another water is rather soft, meaning a total hardness below 5. First of all, the water from the domestic water pipe has to be analyzed carefully. There are various ways to do this.
- Send tap water to a lab
- Have the tap water checked by the water supplier
- Check the tap water yourself
Usually a simple request to the local water supplier is enough and you already have an analysis of the tap water. They usually know what components the water consists of. However, in our opinion, this is not enough.
Why you shouldn't simply rely on these values is mostly due to the localities at home. The pipe network could be made of copper and toxic heavy metals can also accumulate on the way to the house. Therefore, in our opinion, there is no way around a droplet test at home.
Therefore, you should also do some of your own tests, especially what constitutes chlorine, copper, iron, phosphate and ammonia. Even nitrate will already be in tap water.
If you send in the water, then you have a very good and usually a better analysis than with the droplets and strip test known from Tetra, Sera, JBL and Co.
Do I even need water treatment agents?
This question cannot be answered that easily either, because first you have to ask yourself why it can make sense to carry out water treatment even with relatively good water, be it spring or rock water. Unfortunately, even with these very good types of water, trace elements are lost on the way to us.
The reasons for water treatment
Let's now come to the reasons why water treatment of the aquarium water can make sense. Of course, this does not always have to be the case. And not all of the following reasons have to apply either.
- Water heavily polluted by heavy metals
- Water does not correspond to the desired values
- reducing the hardness of the water
- Reduction of the PH value
- Special breeding requirements
- For new buildings and high copper concentrations
- enrichment of trace elements
When should I use water conditioner?
This is of course closely related to the above reasons. The point in time is normally always the regular water change.
Of course, it can also make sense for a new installation to treat the water accordingly.
If you find problems or there are inconsistencies, you should also consider water treatment.
Water treatment with osmosis water / reverse osmosis system
Now let's take a look at the different types of water treatment. Anyone who thinks that water treatment always has something to do with chemicals is wrong. Mostly this is what beginners associate with it. However, professionals and experts prepare their water with osmosis water, for example, and mix this with the appropriate tap water to get exact values for their pools. Be it in breeding or with sensitive fish. The reason can also be very hard tap water, as is the case with us. Lime is standard here. Therefore, even in the community tank, an osmosis system has to be added. Calcium or carbonate can also be changed with a reverse osmosis system. We explain exactly what happens there in a separate article.
Water treatment with chemical additives
Of course, the trade also offers a lot of chemical additives and advertises them extremely. In most cases, however, you can also do without them. If you take a closer look at the ingredients, you will find that, for example, the phosphate is converted into iron phosphate with the help of iron salt. Chelatron is also usually found in these remedies. They ensure that heavy metals are bound. Fixing soda is there to convert the toxic chlorine into chloride. As you can see, it can make sense to help with certain problems in tap water and to use chemical additives. But it should also work with natural remedies without chemicals.
Water treatment with Easy Life
Again and again one reads in the media, magazines and forums that Esay Life should also be a real helper when it comes to water treatment. Here the manufacturer promises not to use any chemical substances and yet certain advantages should be achieved here through natural substances. Be it the reduction of chlorine or ammonium and also copper should be able to be reduced with it. One of the ingredients in Easy Life is clay. Clay floors manage to act like a kind of ionization. Thus, certain chemical compounds are said to be influenced by it. So far we have little experience with this substance.
Water treatment by pre-filtration
This method can also be used to remove other compounds from tap water. If you use a certain pre-filtering of the water, it is possible to influence the water values. Among other things, peat filtering should be mentioned here again.
Ornamental fish have different requirements
Certainly there are many ways to change the water accordingly, but you will not always have to do this. Nevertheless, there are different requirements from fish to fish. For example, fish in the Amazon basin live in very soft water, while the bream in Lake Malawi are used to harder water. The alkaline earths that are dissolved in the water determine whether the water is hard or soft. In addition to calcium and magnesium, these can also be carbonates. These values can also be changed accordingly by adding different substances during water treatment.
Invertebrates such as shrimp or crabs also have different water requirements. They usually love soft water, which should also be rather acidic in terms of PH value. With very few waterworks, this water is made available in this way. Here, too, you should help accordingly. In a nano aquarium, an oxidizer is usually used here. This is also used for fertilization in the tank.
Of course, there are many scientific and biological papers just about the water in an aquarium. This article should only cover the basics.