Question: Alkaline water

Hi everyone, I have been cycling my 3 ft tank for 6 weeks now and since I began the Ph level has been at 7.8. I use bottled spring water for my tanks because I live on a property and don't want to use up all of our tank water. I searched everywhere on this forum and everywhere on the net to try and find answers but there seems to be no way to fix this problem. I have not put my two boys in the tank yet for fear the Ph might upset them as Ferdinand's water is 6.5 and Francis is in the fridge (due to his filter being faulty and making the water unhealthy for him, plus heat stress from the weather at the moment). I'd really love to have them in the big tank it's all decked out with live plants and hiding places.

Also my other tests say Ammonia 0, nitrite 0 and nitrate 5.0. I realise the nitrate is low, it did go up to 20 for a few days last week and then went down after i did a water change. The tank tests have been the same everyday for the last 8 days.

I also tested the spring water from the bottle and it was 6.5 which confuses me because that's the only water I used in all my tanks. Help i'm so confused!

Firstly axies can tolerate pH ranging from 6.5-8. It is not as critical as some of the other water parameters. There is evidence your tank is well underway to being fully cycled.

Do you use any substrate in the tank? Do you have shell ornaments or crushed shell in your tank?

That's good, my other thoughts from what i've read were that perhaps the more alkaline water would be better then trying to change it and having it fluctuate when I put my boys in. I'm glad it sounds like it's nearly done, I can't wait to get them out of the little tank and the fridge.

I have sand as a substrate, extremely well washed and sifted children's play sand that's a little bit under 1cm deep. There's is a large smooth red river rock in there that i brought from the aquarium shop other then that there's only a couple of pots for them to hide in and a pretend log. I image the sand could be the problem only that I put the sand in a week after I set the tank up and the Ph didn't change when I added it.

Oh and a plague of tiny black snails that must have hitch hicked a lift on one of the plants and bred, so i'm picking them out one by one and giving them to my friend. I don't want them in there incase my axies eat them and get sick.