# Drift wood and media questions



## MikeG (Nov 20, 2004)

I have been soaking some drift wood i bought at my lfs (i forget what kind of wood mohagi or something like that lol) and i am waiting for the water to stop turning brown before i put the wood in my tank. I was talking to some rep at my lfs (big als vaughan) and he said the drift wood will raise the ph in my tank, is this true? i thought it would lower the ph if anything. What ever the drift wood does to my ph will it continue to raise or lower the ph to a ridiculous level? or will it change it to a certain level and generally float in that particular ph range? Also does driftwood eventually rot and turn into mush? might be a noob question but its organic and i have never had it before so just wondering. 
Finally my last question... i just bought an emp 280 hob filter and it comes with a grey container for extra media for filtration. i decided to buy ehime substrate pro to put in the container but the guy at my lfs convinced me to buy some marieland gravel that removes ammonia because the emp 280 comes with a bio wheel and that is more than enough for bio filtration. Is that the right choice? i didnt think ammonia was much of a problem as long as u had good bio filtration. what would you guys put in that container? thanks for the help!


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## notaverage (Sep 10, 2005)

I would get more bio media. Thats just me though.
You shouldnt need ammo chips or anything else like that. 
Most of the guys here dont even use carbon. 
Im sure more will chime in soon.


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## RBP7 (Oct 13, 2006)

depending on the size of the drift wood it may necer stop leaching into the water. most ppl add drift wood to their tanks so it darkens the water to make it more like the ammazon. not sure how long it takes to decomp. but mine has been in their for 4 years and still looks fine. as for your new filter i whould add more media.


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## Ja'eh (Jan 8, 2007)

RBP7 said:


> depending on the size of the drift wood it may necer stop leaching into the water. most ppl add drift wood to their tanks so it darkens the water to make it more like the ammazon. not sure how long it takes to decomp. but mine has been in their for 4 years and still looks fine. as for your new filter i whould add more media.


Most people put driftwood in their tanks not to just darken the water but to also lower the ph.


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## Big-Kev (Mar 29, 2008)

If the type of wood you have is mopani, then I wouldn't worry about it rotting becouse it's a very dense wood. I would suggest
that you boil the wood to help it leach out the tannins.


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## JoeDizzleMPLS (Nov 5, 2007)

i've found that mopani driftwood leaches tannins for a bit longer than other types of driftwood, malaysian driftwood for example. the rep at the store was wrong, the leaching of tannic acid into the tank would would lower your ph. it shouldn't lower it to dangerous levels, but it never hurts to keep an eye on that sort of thing, especially if your tap water has a higher ph, that way you can avoid sending your fish into ph shock when doing large volume water changes.

as for the the extra media container, i would fill it with extra bio media. i'm not exactly sure what this marineland gravel is, but if it's some sort of chemical filtration that removes ammonia, it shouldn't be necessary, especially considering the fact that the bacteria in your bio media will convert ammonia as well. the bio-wheels don't provide a whole lot of bio filtration, so the addition of some extra bio media in that container would help out.


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## Piranha Dan (Nov 11, 2007)

I have Moponi. It will lower your PH, not raise it. However it also seems to stablize it a bit. Before I put it in, my PH would go from 6.8-7 to about 6.4 between water changes. Now it just holds steady at 6.4.


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## MikeG (Nov 20, 2004)

Yes it is mopani! and i knew the guy at my lfs was wrong! i should just listen to my instinct from now on, it seems to be right usually. Thanks for the info! u guys are awesome i honestly love this effin website, we should all open a gigantic lfs and run these local untrained staff sportin sh*t holes into the ground. i mean im no expert but i dont go around telling people the completly wrong info and act like im 100% right, i'll tell them what i think is right and state that i am not 100% sure. anyways, sorry to stray, but thanks again. 
I ended up buying eheim substrate pro and ruturning that ammo stuff. also my nitrates are a tad high 40ppm (according to my aquarium pharmaceutials test kit) and i bought somethin called ALGONE, anyone ever heard of it? it claims to be the water clarifier and nitrate remover. should i be using this stuff or is it a bad idea? im just worried that while it reduces nitrates it might in turn produce some unwanted adverse effects. any suggestions?


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## JoeDizzleMPLS (Nov 5, 2007)

leave the chemicals out of your tank, all you need is mech filtration and bio filtration and the only chemical you should be using is your dechlor for water changes. nitrates will always be in your tank, but they are removed by your weekly water changes, if you test your water and your nitrates are high, just do a water change


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## maknwar (Jul 16, 2007)

joedizzlempls said:


> leave the chemicals out of your tank, all you need is mech filtration and bio filtration and the only chemical you should be using is your dechlor for water changes. nitrates will always be in your tank, but they are removed by your weekly water changes, if you test your water and your nitrates are high, just do a water change


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