My Thoughts:

high nitrates and 0 nitrites - probably a good cycle working and converting
ammonia to nitrite to nitrate.

The nitrates are rather high though - you may not be changing enough water
often enough or your source water may be high - test the source water and
post the nitrate level. increase the water changes gradually - don't do one
big one all of a sudden - osmotic shock could result otherwise.

The hardness - sounds pretty hard to me - combined with the 7.8 ph African
cichlids sound like a good option to me.

Cheers

Richard


"ah" wrote in message
...
I have used those Doc Wellfish water chemistry test strips a few
times...while I find them somewhat hard to use (some of the color
gradations are too slight for MY eye to distinguish between...), I
seem to consistently come up with the following readings:

Nitrates - 180
Nitrites - 0
Hardness - Very Hard
Alkalinity - 40
Ph - 7.8


So what does this info mean about my tank water quality and what
should I do to improve things??? Also, what effect would these kinds
of readings have on plant growth???


-Andy