The deluded concept about coconut juice to reduce pH

Originally Posted by Fraserlo

Bingo.................

Luckily you are not those dragons that I talked about in my signature
Anyway, human thoughts are something I have been trying hard to decipher. Many things ironically happens though it shouldn't. This brings in my bewilderment...

[longyu]

good info, bro. Just up your rep pt.

Please check your pm on NO matters

Originally Posted by longyu

good info, bro. Just up your rep pt.

Please check your pm on NO matters

No problems at all. Thanks.
I have replied you too.
Do not distribute. Thanks again.

Originally Posted by zihao

Juice is far too big a difference to be mistaken as husk. And it is not just easily put the coconut husk into the water; As you know, coconut floats. There is more to it that you have to do.

I wonder you have read the part I expressed my bewilderment. If you are at that level to decipher what the test kits and its readings tell you, you are certainly able to be good enough to avoid all the blunders. Ironic isn't it?

I'm not advocating the use of coconut husks. I'm merely saying that the misunderstanding could have its origins there.

When something goes wrong there has already been a blunder somewhere. So what happens at that time? Would you stick to thinking there must be nothing wrong with the water and cancel out that possibility immediately or would you just do a quick test to see if its out of whack and then try to figure out may have inadvertently caused it?

Yap got it.

For the 2nd part, I will look at the fish instead. It will give me a better answer. If isn't your fish giving you symptoms of discomfort, no one will go test their water for fun. Between fish symptoms and water parameters, I would believe the former gives a better tale on what is going on.

Originally Posted by zihao

Between fish symptoms and water parameters, I would believe the former gives a better tale on what is going on.

What would you think is the problem if a fish becomes listless, often staying at the bottom and loses appetite?

[Hobbit6003]

Originally Posted by zihao

Yap got it.

For the 2nd part, I will look at the fish instead. It will give me a better answer. If isn't your fish giving you symptoms of discomfort, no one will go test their water for fun. Between fish symptoms and water parameters, I would believe the former gives a better tale on what is going on.

Well, as a medical practictioner myself, I'd say that to just look at only the signs and symptoms, and ignore other things like a patient's history, complaint, and other test results, would be commiting a cardinal sin in my practice.

Symptoms are just clinical manifestation of a pathologic condition, and water parameters are not necessary used to nail the problem, but it can be used to negate many other problems that may share the common symptoms. Just like in patients with chronic productive cough, you may take a chest xray, hoping that it doesn't show any radiolucency in the lung, and help you exclude any possibilities of a lung infection, eg. atypical pneumonia, etc.

You mentioned that doing water test is only useful if only you can interprete the results and use it. Well, I guess that's what this forum is all about. We continuously preach and teach members about what to look out for and what the readings usually signify, and hopefully the members learn from it. And if they do not know what the problems are and decide to consult members of the forums, some of the water parameters reading will be really useful for members llike us, since we may not have privy to the fish in concern.

Similarly, if the members do not actually know how to read the symptoms and interprete it, wouldn't this be just as useless to him/her as those water tests?

To summise my view, you just cannot rely solely on certain aspect of the manifestation to come up with a more definitive treatment, although experience will certainly help.

To inculcate good fishkeeping practice, I'd say that test kits are essential from time to time. Even for the advanced and most experience fishkeepers, you can never say that things will not go wrong, as many factors can change which one may neglect or ignore.

To think that things are so easy and it'll be a breeze once you've 'mastered' fishkeeping, would be amateurish, IMHO. In life sciences, things are never that straight forward, much less constant, as hypothesis forms and gets overthrown everyday.

Cheers,

Kenny

Originally Posted by lbei

What would you think is the problem if a fish becomes listless, often staying at the bottom and loses appetite?

Shouldn't just look at these minor details. Should be looking at rate of gills movement, colour/texture/etc of its waste, swollen or hollow abdominal area etc. Still, these I believe tell more than the water parameters... well why not you tell me, what are the implications of high level nitrate readings? What can you relate it to?

Well Kenny,

Certainly it is not ignoring but it is priority probing. Searching the forum here, one can easily cite many examples of cases where the hobbyist noticed "unexpected" readings from the test kits, but many often the diseases diagnosed are not related. Does it sound a bell when you see this phrase "I wonder if the test kit is working correctly..." ?

Perhaps I have not put it over clearly enough. What I meant is analysis of symptoms is to more use than collection of readings. It is the symptoms first, then making the tests to determine. Here, I am emphasizing that the symptoms are the determining factor. Many of us have given advice to troubled hobbyist to check on their water parameters, but just like when I ask: " What are the implications of high nitrate readings or high nitrite readings etc?" Many would hesitate to give an answer; But what if the hobbyist stated: "Oh, my fish has cloudy eyes and I just did a water change of 30% - direct tap water untreated; as I discovered I have bad readings", then the answer is obvious and many can give detailed advice on that. It is not the readings that give the correct information, it is the "cloudy eye" and "30% direct change with untreated tap water" in this case. This is the essense that I have been trying to put through, though I think it got misinterpreted or I have put it over incorrectly. "Cloudy eye" is just obvious, and there are many other things that can be left out in the observation lists and these may not be obvious to a starter, so even armed with test readings, the diagnose might still in the end be wrong if based solely on water parameters. "I did 30% untreated tap water change" cant be measured even though the "bad" readings would drop slightly (still as bad taking it started with a real bad situation). So is it the "bad" readings? No it is the untreated tap water change of 30%. Needless to say, there are only a few things the market's test kits can gather. If you know into water chemistry, you will know what I am talking about.

Given symptom descriptions (should not have problem unless the person has visul disability) and a contradicting values/readings from your test kits (contradicting as the water parameters are perfect). What would you take? The answer is obvious again. You can have good water parameters but a sick fish. But you can have sick symptoms but either good or bad water parameters. Yes, I agree on that part that readings might help in differentiating diseases but not entirely a must-follow.

Yap, experience usualy helps in saving lots of steps. Emphasizing on test readings over symptoms observation is pretty much common at least for the threads I saw. There will at least be one or two asking about the readings instead of the symptoms directly. Both co-exist but symptom observation should be more widely emphasized. In short, I think the test reading evaluation has been over-emphasized? What do you think, Kenny?

In the end I still put symptom analysis infront of test kit analysis. Though perhaps I cant say do away with it anymore (the later) since many still find it useful.

Indeed, it is not just hypothesis, even facts get overthrown time to time.
Nice sharing with us your ideas.

Cheers,
Zihao

Originally Posted by zihao

Shouldn't just look at these minor details. Should be looking at rate of gills movement, colour/texture/etc of its waste, swollen or hollow abdominal area etc. Still, these I believe tell more than the water parameters... well why not you tell me, what are the implications of high level nitrate readings? What can you relate it to?

What if the gill movements are slightly more laboured, colour of waste and texture and size and density and everything else is normal? Stomach is flat, not sunken nor bloated.?

By the way I'm not implying that those signs I stated earlier are patterns linked to water parameters problems. They are signs that could or could not be due to water. I only put out some common 'symptoms' because I am curious what you will do in such cases. My point is that instead of guessing whether it is the water, why not just make a quick test?