How do I raise water hardiness??

[u/basedandbugpilled]

Sorry if I make any typos in this post, I am kinda panicing.

This all started awhile ago when my yellow Mystery Snail Smoothie passed away. I had gotten them from a petstore (if that changes anything) then obtained 2 more snails from the same store. They have constant access to two cuttle bones and a rather large rodent bone for calcium. The rodent was found on a hike, was cleaned of any dirt, left to soak for a week and then placed into the tank for decor. They just started nibbling on it.

I have always struggled with keeping my tank's hardiness up but I thought I was doing a good job for the most part. Doing what I was told online to add calcium carbonate in small amounts to keep it how my snails like it. I now just checked it and it's soft. I now just read I shouldn't add calcium carbonate and another place I checked said to use Tums for some reason and now I am beyond lost.

Normally I wouldn't be panicking as bad but I am still a bit upset over the loss of my snail Smoothie and I noticed one of my white snails, Frosting, has a soft spot on their operculum it looks like (I am not risking touching it) and both my older snails (Frosting and Chocolate Chip) are showing signs of calcium deficiency. What am I doing wrong? I have seen them eating at the cuttle bones and the rodent one, and both have bits scaped off/missing. Do they need more? I am so confused

[u/Emuwarum]

What is your tank ph? And what is the ph and hardness of your tap water?

[u/basedandbugpilled → u/Emuwarum]

7.8 for my tank. And I don't use tap water, I use jugs of drinking water because I was told that it was better and more base line. I am not sure the ph and hardness cause I have never actually thought to check it cause I just assumed it would be fine. It's good enough to drink after all

In hindsight, that was really really stupid of me. This is probably my fault

[u/Emuwarum → u/basedandbugpilled]

Can you check your tap water and compare it to the bottle and see which one is harder? 

Many people don't think to test their source water, it's fine.

[u/basedandbugpilled → u/Emuwarum]

It's 2 gpg according to the town website. I'm a bit hesitant to use my testing equipment because 1. It's 2 in the morning and 2. I am currently snowed in so I don't want to use all my stuff cause I still need to test my other tank.

I thought that you can't use straight tap water

[u/Emuwarum → u/basedandbugpilled]

You just use dechlorinator in tap water. Testing it without dechlorinator shouldn't matter.

You can go to sleep and test in the morning. It probably won't be super urgent to check the ph and hardness of your other tank.

[u/Shrooms1020]

You can definitely add calcium carbonate its not just safe they need it