new guy here

[mike batptiste]

ok will do ill stop in there as soon as the wife is home and have a test done ill let you know whats what
i really think my problem is lite i just dont think i have enough

 

[RCS]

How long did you have the corals for? All three you mentioned are carnivorous and should be fed. The sun coral is completely non-photosynthetic and requires feeding. Light really will make little difference to the corals you're currently trying to keep, at least not nearly as much as proper feeding will. They all need larger pieces of food, such as chopped shrimp or mysis. You should be able to sustain them even with PCs.

 

[Aquabucket]

The tap water here RCS is 345 to 370 ppm. I would hardly recommend anyone to use it if they want to keep anything beyond softies.

Before I took over at the store they were using tap water and they could not stock an LPS for more than a week before it melted away and died. SPS were something that the previous manager never even attempted to carry.

Within 2 months after changing over to RO/DI I was stocking wild colonies of SPS and clams.

 

[RCS]

The tap water here RCS is 345 to 370 ppm. I would hardly recommend anyone to use it if they want to keep anything beyond softies.

Depends on what that 345-370 is really made from. I used to live in Kaukauna with a conductivity reading out the tap at 1600-1800 uS (TDM around 800-900ppm) and kept various leathers, frogspawn, hammer, and other corals just fine. My Ca was also very high (800ppm) and my pH was a litte low, though rock-solid at 7.8-7.9.

Not something I'd recommend all in all, but that depends on the individuals tap water. Our water out of the tap here in Knoxville is 6.5 with a TDS around 50-60.

 

[Aquabucket]

Phosphate and silicate levels here in Green Bay are unexceptable and you will find that a tank using RO will have much less brown slime and cyno. Reef tanks require high flow rates the more the better IMO. With this comes high amounts of evaporation. Individual systems vary in the amounts of evaporation and pure water that needs to be replaced.

If one wants to provide the optimal water for thier captive reef tanks <b>pure water</b> is the only choice. If you want to skimp and expose your livestock to things they were not intended to go ahead and gamble.

Your chances of having a healthly ~ sparkling clean tank are increased dramatically by using pure water. The diversity of livestock you can keep also increases.

I have seen many tanks here in the GB area that use tap water and plenty that don't and not one tank using tap water had the diversity of life or the clarity of an RO tank. Most all had brown slime and cyno blooms occuring in places throughout the tank.

The debate is simply this:

Optimal water or questionable water. Which do you want to choose?

 

[RCS]

I'm not arguing against you, I think I already said that. Pure water is obviously better to start with if we're working under the assumption that the salts we use contain everything we need in them.

My point was simply that tap water in some cases can easily be used (as is my case now). Not everyone is going to go out and buy an RO unit, or purchase RO water, and there are instances where it's not really needed, or simply overkill.

Is using pure water to start with ideal? Of course it is. Is it necessary in a FOWLR tank? Highly unlikely. Some corals that take their nutrients from the water column (softies, zoanthids, discosoma, etc.) might even fare better in a tank with higher dissolved solids in it. If you're a hardcore SPS fanatic, then you'll likely be better off with RO water. Granted Green Bay's water stinks, so an RO unit will be a good investment for most people.

But you can always check my gallery and see if my corals disagree with me.

 

[mike batptiste]

i dont know guys i had my water tested and it seems fine every thing was just rite he said i didnt get the numbers but the water came back great he said so im not really sure i just think if i up my liting my tank would be alot better