Tap Water Quality Alert: Brisbane Storm Season Is Changing Your Water Chemistry

Issued: current storm season, southeast Queensland. Every year around this time we get the same run of calls into the shop. Someone did a normal water change, and by the next morning their fish are gasping at the surface or their shrimp are dropping like flies. The common thread is almost always mains water chemistry swinging hard after heavy rain, and nobody checked their numbers before topping up.

Why storm season messes with your tap water

Seqwater and Urban Utilities adjust treatment dosing when catchments get hit with runoff. That means chloramine levels can jump around, turbidity spikes, and dissolved solids in the source water shift more than usual. Your RODI membranes and resins were calibrated to handle normal load. Storm season throws them a curveball, and a cartridge that was fine in July can be exhausted early in a wet February.

What to check this week

• Test your RODI output TDS before every top up, not just once a month. Anything above 0 to 1 ppm on a fresh system means it is time to change cartridges.
• Check chloramine breakthrough with a basic test kit if you are unsure your carbon stage is still active. Brisbane water authorities may increase chloramine dosing temporarily during heavy rain events.
• Watch ammonia in freshwater tanks closely for the next fortnight. A chloramine spike that overwhelms your carbon stage can push free ammonia straight into the tank.
• Keep Dr Tim's Aquacleanse on hand to bind ammonia fast if you catch a spike between water changes.
• Inspect RODI tubing and fittings for pressure creep. Heavier source water sediment can strain connectors faster than usual.

Gear worth having ready

A reliable TDS meter should live next to your top up container this month, not in a drawer. If your RODI unit is due for a service, do it now rather than after a bad reading. And if you are still relying on eyeballing your tank instead of testing, grab something from our freshwater testing range before the next big downpour rolls through.

Bottom line

Storm season does not mean your tap water is unsafe outright. It means it is less predictable. Ten minutes with a TDS meter before you fill a bucket will save you a much longer night troubleshooting a stressed or dying tank.

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