Changing the Aquarium Water of Cichlids

Keeping up on your water changes keeps an aquarium healthy by preventing fish waste from accumulating. Cichlids, in particular, come from such diverse conditions that many require specialized water. This makes changing the aquarium water for cichlids a little more complicated.

  1. Cichlids and Water Chemistry

    • Most cichlids come from Africa, South America and Central America. A few species come from Asia and one comes from North America. Individual species of cichlids have adapted to specific water conditions, and need these replicated in home aquariums in order to thrive in captivity. Generally, you keep only cichlids who come from the same general area in an aquarium. For example, cichlids from the Amazon river and cichlids from the African Great Lakes need very different water; species from one area couldn't survive in water appropriate for the other.

    Soft Water Species

    • River-dwelling cichlids from South America and western Africa generally prefer soft, acidic water. For fish like these, you can use RO water -- water purified through reverse osmosis -- makes good water for these fish. When using RO water, you may need to add buffers, since RO water has no dissolved minerals to buffer the pH. You can purchase buffering products from most aquarium supply stories or online.

    Hard Water Cichlids

    • The famous/infamous African cichlids, as well as the cichlids of Central America, prefer their water hard with a high pH. Pet stores sell "cichlid salts," mineral salts that raise the pH and hardness of water. You can usually use these products with dechlorinated tap water. However, if your local tap water is high in phosphates or has some other issue, you can use RO water as your starting point.

    Changing Water Conditions

    • When setting up an aquarium to accommodate cichlids, it's best to start out with water that already has their ideal conditions and work from there. However, if you already have your aquarium up and running, you need to make any changes to the pH and hardness slowly. Fish react poorly to sudden changes in water conditions -- even changes towards ide conditions. You can slowly increase or decrease the pH, either by adding cichlid salts or diluting the aquarium water with RO water, but do not try to change the pH by more than 0.2 per day.