is my tap water safe to drink?

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velvet8
Posts: 44
Joined: Fri Feb 09, 2024 5:24 am

Re: is my tap water safe to drink?

Post by velvet8 »

aquabite wrote: Mon Mar 03, 2025 5:23 pm Quick question - I've been wondering about this for a while now. Should I be using the tap water that runs through my water softener? I checked with my city and they told me my average water hardness is 195 PPM.

Thanks in advance for your help, everyone.
You shouldn't use water that's been through a softener, it's not good for your fish. The softener uses a high level of sodium to remove the calcium and magnesium, which is basically what makes the water hard. This sodium is really bad for freshwater fish, they can't handle it in the long term.
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sSjey
Posts: 326
Joined: Mon Jan 17, 2022 11:23 am

Re: is my tap water safe to drink?

Post by sSjey »

You're best off using a tap that bypasses the softener - most systems have one.

Your water hardness of 195 ppm isn't actually that hard, it works out to 11 dH, which is more middle-of-the-road than hard. For a domestically bred Betta, this should be fine.

If you do want to soften the water, you can mix it with a pure water source. A 50/50 split will bring the GH down to 5.5 dH, while a 3:1 ratio of tap to pure water will give you a GH of 8.25 dH.

As for pure water sources, you've got a few options - RO, DI, distilled, or even rainwater if the air quality is good and you can collect it regularly.
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