Blackwater fish tank for Rift Lake cichlids?

[confusedfishkeeper]

I love blackwater fish tanks. I understand that blackwater tanks are low ph and aimed at south american cichlids. but my question is most fish that we keep are captive bred and not wild caught (at least in my country). Some are bred in my city, others are imported from Thailand / Malaysia/Indonesia. Would a low PH / driftwood heavy environment impact the rift lake cichlids negatively? I have frontosa, duboisi and livingstoni. My tank has lot of bogwood, some almond leaves and alder cones. At one point became almost pitch black. Had to make some water changes and now it is tea colored (loving it). The fish seem to be doing fine. Am I doing something wrong that can hurt the fish in the long run?

 

[tlindsey]

I love blackwater fish tanks. I understand that blackwater tanks are low ph and aimed at south american cichlids. but my question is most fish that we keep are captive bred and not wild caught (at least in my country). Some are bred in my city, others are imported from Thailand / Malaysia/Indonesia. Would a low PH / driftwood heavy environment impact the rift lake cichlids negatively? I have frontosa, duboisi and livingstoni. My tank has lot of bogwood, some almond leaves and alder cones. At one point became almost pitch black. Had to make some water changes and now it is tea colored (loving it). The fish seem to be doing fine. Am I doing something wrong that can hurt the fish in the long run?

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If the PH is anywhere close to being acidic I would avoid putting African Rift lake Cichlids in that environment.
Yes in the long run it will have a definite affect on the African Rift lake species.

 

[Stephen St.Clair]

As long as the water is hard with an elevated PH, the bogwood probably won't significantly lower PH. So you can still have the look of a black water tank w/o the undesired acidity.
Although most hatchery fish are probably more adaptive to water parameter extremes, IMO, it's not a good idea to push the issue unless there exist a reason to do so.

 

[DJRansome]

Here the best retailers keep the Africans at a higher pH and often tap water is higher in any case. Why not create an African tank if you want Africans?

 

[Rocksor]

Measure your buffering capacity KH, general hardness (GH), total dissolved solids, and PH values. If they are low values, the Africans will show issues in the long run. A low TDS value will affect their osmoregulatory function, and then their health.

 

[confusedfishkeeper]

I use tap water which is hard and should somewhat balance the impact of driftwood/leaves/alder cones. Thank you all for the suggestions. It has been very helpful. I would get a testing kit and measure the ph. Should have done it earlier.

 

[neutrino]

I generally agree with the comments above. Ime the deal is, yes, you can have water colored by driftwood or leaves as long as you keep pH stable and high enough with KH buffering. I don't know just how black is okay, but ime as long as pH and hardness stay where they should, they're fine with some color from tannins. For example, I've raised kapampa gibberosa fry with driftwood that colored the water and they did quite well.

Ime rift lake cichlids vary some in whether they're fine in close to neutral water or need higher pH. For example, having kept them for years and done some breeding, my kapampa gibberosa do better with pH at least in the mid 7s or higher, low 7s and they're more prone to issues. Also, with my particular well water chemistry they need added magnesium, which I add in the form of Epsom Salts, otherwise the females have issues releasing eggs-- Lake Tanganyika is higher in magnesium than Lake Malawi or Victoria. Many generation captive bred C. frontosa don't seem as fussy about pH and when I kept them they didn't need the added magnesium.

 

[Deadeye]

I added manzanita to my rift lake tank, didn’t leech too much (I did have yellow water for a few weeks). It’s possible as long as you keep hardness and ph in acceptable levels for the cichlids.

 

[djsaltynuts]

if the tank is just colored darkly it isnt really black water imo it just has humic acid in the water column. make sure the ph doesn’t represent that of a blackwater tank. make sure you dont mix the africans and south americans just because you mixed the environments because it is important for african cichlids to have a higher ph for longterm health and south americans are the opposite. i dont think you should keep rift lake cichlids below 7.2.