Well Water - What To Look For?

[yuri]

I've been carting my water in from "the city" for my aquariums, and my other half & I are about ready for some options. :P

So, I was wanting to get my water tested, and see if it may be suitable, pre or post filtration for the fishies & plants, either in part or all together.

What should I be looking for?

Out of the tap it is slightly yellowish and smells sulfur-y.

I have a 60 Gallon, a 10 Gallon, and am looking at setting up a 5 Gallon & Bowl in the near future.

Fish: Neon Tetras, Glowlight Tetras, Black Neon Tetras, Tiger Barbs, Harlequin Rasboras, Cherry Barbs, Bettas & an Apple Snail. (also looking at ghost shrimp, cardinals, otocinclus & upside down catfish)

Plants: Corkscrew Vals, Java Moss, Dwarf Sag, Frogbit, Anubias Nana, "?" Anubias, & Mystery plant.

thank you very much!

Brittany

[Jayba]

Carting water from the city would be a pain. Especially if you get bigger tanks one day. Do you know what is causing the smell? Sulfates, H2S? Or possibly you need a deeper well. Maybe it is sediments?

Having the water tested will tell you whats in the water , then yo can devise a plan based on that to counter it. Maybe as simple as cutting it down with RO water. Who know....

Just pick fish that live in the type of water you have.

[Fisher]

Our province offers free well water testing for private wells used for drinking water. The chemical analysis will give you some objective metrics (including toxicity) that will help you assess your options. We have a 300g cistern which complicates matters for us.

The smell can come from different sources, but well dwelling bacteria is a typical culprit.

Our water is high TDS, ph, sodium compared to CDW guidelines... we thought it was high iron, but it's not.

We pay $3.85/5g for water, and we only go though 5g a week for coffee and drinking.

I don't know much about RO because our current circumstance doesn't warrant it. But I think your well metrics will impact RO maintenance....

[Sprucegruve]

Also another route not many people think about instead of r/o is a steam distillation unit.That's what I'm looking into,less maintance and upkeep for pretty much the same results.

[Fisher]

Also another route not many people think about instead of r/o is a steam distillation unit.That's what I'm looking into,less maintance and upkeep for pretty much the same results.

A gizmo with two uses. :thumbs:

Thanks for th tip!

[cullymoto]

^{having high TDS will significantly lessen the life-span of an r/o unit... to the point where it would not be worth running one. If your heart is set on an r/o unit, you would first need a water softner system. The r/o unit is 2nd in line and fully removes the remaining dissolved solids as well as the salt left in the water by the water softner. I run a pure r/o system on Spruce grove tap water (General hardness in the 300ppm range) and although it is high for my r/o system I have gotten 1 year out of a set of filter/membrane in my r/o. I use it proliferously... now my water actually has to have minerals added to it (discus specific in my case) for something like African cichlids you actually want high TDS... in that case your water may be perfect, and just require a simple activated carbon type drinking water filter (think Brita and you have the right idea) to remove the sulfur smell from it. good luck}