[Wayne's World]

I've been using a Pinpoint Ph meter for quite a while now. It's great to have, to monitor Ph. Mostly my ph has maintained 8.22 -8.32. Last couple of days though the Ph has been going up to 8.42. This must be fairly accurate as the Zenia have decided not to really expand and a green star polyp has decided not to come out at all. All other mushrooms and button polyps, colt coral and of course fish seem oblivious to this.
Does anyone have any idea of why and what to do with this high Ph. I've only had experience with low ph, usually caused by high bio load, or just not pristine water quality.
I've changed the meter's battery and hopefully I will aquire the calibration solutions shortly.
Recently (Saturday) I added an airstone to my venturi, Amiracle. I
"now" suspect this is the cause. I am just questioning if there is anything that can be done to lower the Ph to an acceptable level.

[bongobrian]

Wayne's World- Welcome to Reefland!

I don't think a ph of 8.42 would be harmful to a reeftank at all. The ph of natural sea water is around 8.4 (if I remember correctly.) My tank's ph ranges anywhere from 8.4 to 8.6 and all corals, anemones, and inverts are doing very well. I wouldn't think that an airstone would increase your ph. Usually ph rises naturally when you have something that is removing the C02 from the water like macro and micro algea. Dripping kalk can also cause ph to rise, and some people do this on purpose in order to precipitate phosphate. IMO it's not your ph that is causing your corals to close up. I would not, for one second, be worried about a ph of 8.4 in my tank.

[Anthony Calfo]

Brian, rock on my brother...

Wayne, you have it quite backwards, my friend.

Not that it means a whole lot, but average natural seawater is 8.45

Ideal reef pH in closed reef systems is a nightime drop of no LOWER than 8.3. Daytime climb to 8.6 is normal and cool. Reading consistently lower indicate an alkalinity problem in many cases.

Xenia elongata can reliably close below a pH of 8.3 especially as it approaches 8.0 (dangerous).

I could not sum it up any better than Brian's reply and I have cultured and sold over 10,000 colonies of Xenia alone in the past decade.

Best of luck to you.

[Wayne's World]

Thanks all:
I have left well enough alone and everything seems perfectly ok now.
Ph still is a little high (went down) and is now peaking at about 8.33.
Shut off the additional air stone. I actually had to, due to the fact that it overlowed the skimmer and its container, onto the hardwood floors.
My weee lad played with the adjustable air pump. Salt water 1 hard wood floors -1000. All critters, don't care about the floors but are very happy.