RO water

[az1]

Hi Ev

I thought I would sart a thread here rather than in the intro section to answer your question.

RO stands for reverse osmosis with an RO unit setting you back about $300-400 in Oz.

What it does is denude water of any and all minirals leaving pure water. It does this by first filtering the water through micro filters and carbon filters and then sending the water past a semi permiable membrane from one side of the mebrane you get pure water from the other side you get more concentrate or waste water. The ratio of pure to waste water is about 1:5.

There are a number of sites that have info on RO just do a search.

Having said all that I am aware that somebody has bred zebs in Melbourne without using RO water. They use straight tap water treating it with prime.

Until I heard this and also reading through the various posts on this site, I was using RO water but have now changed over to using aged tap water. The advantage to me of using straight tap water is I can do more frequent water changes and achieve this with much less effort.

Since I changed over to straight water (PH 7.5) a view of my Zeb's have started sitting accros the entrance of caves, so as long as I have soem willing females the moment shouldn't be more than 3 months off.

I assume for the price you will be getting fairly small zebs so you will need to be growing them for a while. Mine have been growing for about 2 years having obtained them at about 3cm.

Cheers

Andreas

[Dr. P]

Great advice the Andreas!

I am aware that somebody has bred zebs in Melbourne without using RO water. They use straight tap water treating it with prime.

Until I heard this and also reading through the various posts on this site, I was using RO water but have now changed over to using aged tap water. The advantage to me of using straight tap water is I can do more frequent water changes and achieve this with much less effort.

I too use straight (but aged and dechlorinated) tap water and have been lucky enough to have 2 successful spawns so far (having had the L46 since last September).

[Barbie]

Andreas, now that you've got them in straight tap water, try doing a couple 30% changes with cool RO water. Once a day for 3 days usually does it fine. The drop in TDS was for sure the trigger for the L260, and has occasionally worked as the trigger for the zebras here. Sometimes they just spawn when they feel like it, if I don't get around to trying to trigger them soon enough .

Barbie

[sid]

Barbie.....what kinda tds do your L260 spawn at?.......................mine come out the tap at 95-100.tds......its real soft here ..................so how could i trigger mine?

[Barbie]

Sid, if you check your tank water when it hasn't had changes for a couple weeks, you should see a pretty good rise in TDS. If it's not getting above 200, you can add a teaspoon of regular table salt every couple days til you get it up to 250-300. Then when you start the rainy season, do a 50% water change (since your incoming water will have some hardness as well you'll have to change more water to shift it) and drop the temp 8-10 degrees in the tank. Then allow the heater to take the tank back up to it's normal temperature. Repeat for 4 or 5 days and you should have a spawn within a few days of when you stop the rains.

Barbie

[sid]

Cheers babes

[Ev]

Hi guys,
Thanks for the info on Ro water it is realy helpful. Do I realy need a RO unit?

For all my tanks set up I just do a 30% water change once a week with normal tap water which I add the water crystals to. My normal tap water reads a PH of 7 - 7.2.

To have aged dechlorinated water, do you have a spare tank set up running just for the Zebra's water changes? or do you take the water out from another tank with fish in it?

And yes I'm getting Little Zebra's so they will have some growing to do.

Thanks for all the advice
Ev

[az1]

Hi Ev

I age or treat my tap water in a seperate container and then have a pump to pmp it to my aquariums.

I use a 1200 lt container currently and it takes me 1 and a 1/2 containers for a water change on all mt aquariums.

That is why I mention age and or treat as my routine is to fill the container at the end of the water change (and treat with prime) then leave it for top ups etc until the next water change (or partial). In the middle of the water change when I run out of aged water I refill the container, treat the water and keep going.

Depending on your water requirements you should be able to source a 200 lt barrel andutilise in a similar manner as described. Obviously this would also be dependent on your logistical set up.

Regardless of how you do it I would strongly urge you to treat the water prior to adding it to your zebra tank as the amount of money invested is way to much to take any risks.

Cheers

Andreas

[Ev]

Hi Andres,
Thanks for the info on your set up.
I have a tank already set up for the zebra's but I have only added dechlorinated water crystals to the water, when setting it up and in water changes. What do you use prime for? do I need to add this to their water as well? What type of pump do you use to pump the water out of your ageing barrel? As I would like to do this as well.

Thanks for all the help
Ev