Homemade Black Water

[Ted L. Dutcher]

Here is my method of making Black water for the tanks. Don’t tell my wife that it is done in the kitchen!!

I use peatmoss that has been soaked for 2+ weeks in a large plastic bag. The longer you soak it, the darker it percs.

It is very easy, just use peat instead of coffee grounds. I add this to 5 gallons of RO water.

[Maciej]

It would be good, but sadly most of the peat is wasted this way. If you want to make it good, then find yourself old stockings, fill it with peat, and boil such a “Wurst” on the lowest setting. After sbput am hour you’ll get enogh peat concentrate to completely blacken your aquarium. Mine was hard to se through after an addition of about half a liter of such a concentrate.

[Ted L. Dutcher]

Thank you Sverting, a great idea. That would make a concentrate so I need not “perc” everytime I make the RO water!!! My tanks are not dark, just a nice golden color.

[Peter Finke]

Sverting’s method with that old female nylon stocking is a good one. It is used by experienced breeders for long.

[Ted L. Dutcher]

Interesting topic.

Obviously the European fish hobbiest and fish breeding is way beyond our techiques here in the states, as far as the techniques are concerned. A good example is this topic. Funny I thought I came up with a good idea… it is, but an old idea, lol

Very often the recommended plan is to just buy Black Water Extract or throw some leaves in the tank and wait!!

I remember years ago that finding Appistos was a nightmare… but Europe was already years ahead of us.

Thanks to internet and better communications we are now able to share and the lag of info is getting shorter.

[Stephen Parlin]

Hi,

I’m a US fish keeper and first time poster here. I keep a handful of blackwater species, and here’s how I prepare my water. I use a Brute 32 gallon trashcan (it sits on coasters so I can movie it around the fishroom), toss in a couple large filter media bags full of Sera Superpeat granules (Fluval peat didn’t seem to get the pH as low as Sera) and reconstitute the water a small bit with Kent RO Right up to about 60 ppm TDS. The pH in the trashcan after a few days is around 5.2. I keep 1 to 2 small filter media bags of peat in the blackwater tanks themselves. When I do weekly water changes, I check the tanks and the pH has continued to drop to around 4.5 or so. This method would work well with a 5 gallon bucket or any other size container as well.

Steve

[Ted L. Dutcher]

Thank you Steve, another good method has popped up!!

Welcome to our forum !! Glad to have you.

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