Taking too good care of my tank?

[mlefev]

I just wondered if it was possible to be too particular about cleaning and maintenancing my tank. Here's why...

For the past few months I have been doing water-changes and cleanings 1-2 times a week at about 10%-20% per water change. My nitrates were always a bit whacky, my KH was 3-4 and my PH was about 8.5-9 (like my tap water).

So, I've had a bad couple of weeks and haven't really cleaned much, and only did 1 vaccuming of the tank. Now, the PH somehow has dropped to about 7-7.5, the KH is 7, the nitrates are under .03ppm and the ammonia is 0. It seems that neglecting the tank a bit actually helped it out...is this normal?

[Damon]

What type of tank is it?

[mlefev]

Just a plain old 10 gallon. I have some anarchis in there, decorations, and 9 fish (danios, tetras, platies and a clown pleco). I also have a ton of snails that I've been trying to get out of it. Equipment-wise I have a heater, a hang on the back filter, and the light and hood that came with it.

[mousey]

I was told once that I cleaned too thoroughly and sucked out too much mulm which contains the good bacteria as well as cleaning the filter too vigorously which also killed the filter.
Some of the organic stuff seems to bring the ph and hardness down.
Mouse

[solar-ton]

yeah sucking out good bacteria is the problem...maybe

[DavidDoyle]

This might help:

How much buffering does your tank need? Most aquarium buffering capacity test kits actually measure KH. The larger the KH, the more resistant to pH changes your water will be. A tank's KH should be high enough to prevent large pH swings in your tank over time. If your KH is below roughly 4.5 dH, you should pay special attention to your tank's pH (e.g, test weekly, until you get a feel for how stable the pH is). This is ESPECIALLY important if you neglect to do frequent partial water changes. In particular, the nitrogen cycle creates a tendency for an established tank's pH to decrease over time. The exact amount of pH change depends on the quantity and rate of nitrates produced, as well as the KH. If your pH drops more than roughly two tenths of a point over a month, you should consider increasing the KH or performing partial water changes more frequently. KH doesn't affect fish directly, so there is no need to match fish species to a particular KH.

From http://fins.actwin.com/mirror/begin.html

[mlefev]

Hmm this is interesting. It would explain why my PH is dropping (actually that's good to a point, it is high out of the tap). My KH is also slowly going up in the tank, so that's good, it was only 3-4 there for a long time.