Reef crystals, and GARF grunge

[madmax7774]

I am getting ready to salt my tank, now that it has run successfully for several weeks with plain water (leak testing and build concept verification). It is a 75 gallon that is going to be a reef tank. I was about to buy a bucket of instant ocean, but I saw that they have reef crystals and had not seen them before. Are reef crystals better for a reef tank, and should I use that for the inital salt mix? Is it worth the extra cost? also if I use them, is it a one time thing, or is this an upgrade so to speak from regular instant ocean salt mix? Also, when I lay down the sand bed and rock, I was thinking of seeding everything with 10 lbs of GARF grunge. Has anyone else tried this stuff, and do they like it? I wasn't planning on using live sand as a substrate, because I really want black sand, but am going to use 90 lbs of live rock. I was hoping the grunge would help seed the live sand and supplement the rock.
thoughts???
John

 

[wetWolger]

Never tried the grunge....but as far as your salt I don't think it will matter. Reef crystals is supposed to have a little higher Ca. But I have heared reports that RC has slightly lower Mg than IO. So it is a toss up. I used to use Kent but they recently changed there formula and what I am going to start doing is buying RC, and IO. And mix them 50/50. To try to even out any odditys from the two mixes. IMO this should give me a good cost/benifit ratio.

 

[whiteshark]

Garf grunge, i've never used. About the reef crystals, it is IO with more calcium, basically. You are just paying for the extra calcium.

 

[whiteshark]

FYI, i use tropic marin pro, never had any problems. There is a huge "best salt debate". I suggest looking through this forum for salt discussions.

 

[Billybeau1]

RC is higher in mag than IO. I've tested this first hand. Also higher in calcium. Its a good salt IMO. So is IO for that fact. But they dont call it REEF Crystals for nothing.

 

[fragaholic]

Garf Grunge is garbage IME. I am still tring to remove it from my sand bed, its an eyesore and had no visable signs of life when first put in my tank.

 

[GARFVolunteer]

GARF Grunge is pretty good stuff IMO. I have added to most of the tanks I have set up. If you are going with something like the black Tahitian sand, I would get the grunge lite (I think they still have it) which is finer than the original... I would only get the original Grunge if I had a coarse substrate like you would have with a plenum.

Thanks,

Scott

 

[rustybucket145]

Grunge is a pretty good way to get some diversified corraline algae introduced into your tank.