On 7 Dec 2004 00:10:44 -0800, "yj" wrote:

Ealier this year, just when I finally got everything in my new planted
tank going well, a few of my fish got ich. I went to the store and
bought some standard ich medication. As suggested, I turned up the
temperature to 82F to speedup the ich cycle. After a day, half of all
my plants melted away and more fish got ich. I guess I was making a
very bad vegetable soup and none of my fish liked it. I've never used
medication nor turned up the temperature to above 74F since then. All
my plants and fish eventually recovered.

After having my 75 gallon tank for 5 months, I decided I wanted to
lower the pH to 7.0 down from 7.8. Since this required chemical to
achieve, I got smart and decided to put diluted hydrochloric acid in
the tank. I was working, but the tank would go back to 7.8 awfully
fast. To this day I can't figure what happened, but after making the
daily adjustment, I saw all the fish cowering in a corner, their eyes
were red and a few were dead. As fast as I could I removed water and
replaced it. Most of the fish recovered, but I lost some that were
quite special. I decided no more chemicals in my tank. That happened
18 months ago. No more accidents and about 3 months ago I even
stopped using charcoal in my filtration. I rely totally on 20% water
changes twice a week.

dick