Salt

[Tomoko Schum]

Hi y'all,

Since our forum is rather quiet, I decided to report my finding about a salt mix. This is totally anecdotal and I have no scientific data to back up my claim, but I am seeing an absolutely positive result from Seachem's Reef Salt.

During the summer I was noticing that my corals were growing rather slowly - it was like they just stopped (except for the darn xenia.) All the water parameters were in good ranges. I was quite puzzled about this to say the least.

So, a couple of month ago, I switched my salt mix from IO to Seachem's Reef Salt, partly because my last bag of Instant Ocean out of the large box turned funny with moisture - lots of precipitants. John also told me that he had problems with a recent batch of IO. I recall a number of people on RC was buzzing about bad batches of IO salt around the same time.

I have made a few water changes with Reef Salt now and suddenly I am seeing quite a growth spurt on all of my SPS's.

This may be quite coincidental, but I have not changed any reef keeping practice since this summer. No change other than the salt mix. My temperature is staying pretty much the same, too (78 to 81). I told some of you during the last meeting that I quit my attempt to get my fish drunk during the summer, but that was two months or so before the salt mix change.

Have any of you had a similar experience with this salt mix?

Tomoko

 

[NicoleC]

I was a fan of IO, but also tried SeaChem. I started it about 9 months ago. It seems to be high quality with great levels of everything, however I get a lot of residue and buildup in mixing buckets and on pumps. Enough to require soaking pumps in vinegar about every month.

OTOH, my pH levels have never been more stable.

And the harshest test for any salt mix is raising larvae -- I switched to SeaChem Marine in the larval tanks and had NO issues at all.

 

[buzzbait00]

I've came off IO too.Im trying Coralife right now.So far so good!but i've read good things about Seachem.

Buzz!

 

[Tomoko Schum]

Hi Nicole,

Good to hear from you again!

I see some residue on the bottom of my mixing container, too. Yikes, an increase in the maintenance! I soak my pumps in a weak HCl solution just about every other month. I don't mind increasing my pump maintenance frequency for a better coral growth, though.

What are you breeding? I suspect yellow watchman gobies, judging from the picture of the pair in your avatar.

Tomoko

 

[MaryBebo]

I have only used the IO reef crystals and I just bought a new bucket that I haven't opened that I bought from John Newby when we had the meeting at 8 balls. I hope it is ok since he had problems. MY coral growth hasn't changed for good or bad about the same. Still having issues with algae though.

I will have to see how your doing when I need a new bucket.

 

[NicoleC]

Tomoko, I'm out of the breeding biz; my pairs have gone on to another breeder. My only current fish are two siblings from my old clown pair (basically, the last two after all the rest had sold) and Lad, the sole YWG survivor... of about 2000 larvae!

 

[Philip Root]

Eric Borman did a study about the salts. He released his data At macna this year. Let's say IO was not on the top of the list. However, Red Sea and IO's upper end; reef crystals got good marks. SeaChem was not out when He stared his test. I was shocked by some of the things that happened in the study.

 

[Tomoko Schum]

Mary -

I would not worry about it if you don't see any problem. I have been using IO for many years and I have not had any problem until the last batch that drew moisture. I am sure something changed chemically when it got moist. The white precipitants might have had more than calcium carbonate bound up in it.

Nicole -

Wow, 2000 larvae?! That's a lot to raise on your own. :eek2: You would have had so many mouths to feed if even a half of them survived. Lots of buckets and containers tied up for the little guys, too.

As for the Borneman's study that Philip mentioned, I saw some of the study details that were posted on the website of a club in Houston, TX. They had a heck of a lot of the photos of the test tanks. The preliminary results sounded very interesting. I recall that the tank with IO suffered from cyano from the get go and never really caught up with others. It was surprising to find that a lot of junk including cyano spores and zoo plankton eggs were found in various salt mix. But then again it should not be... When I was living in Japan, there were still some open fields in some parts of Japan where ocean water was concentrated and dried to produce sea salt.

Tomoko

 

[NicoleC]

Nicole -

Wow, 2000 larvae?! That's a lot to raise on your own. :eek2: You would have had so many mouths to feed if even a half of them survived.[/B]

Well, as I said only ONE survived. YWG nests can have tens of thousands of larvae. 2000 was a weak hatch-out.

 

[hlp]

Tomoko,

Where did you purchase the Seachem's Reef Salt? We need to buy some soon and are looking for something other than IO also for some of the same reasons you mentioned.

Thanks,
Jason

 

[Tomoko Schum]

Hi Jason,

I picked up Seachem's Reef Salt from Coral Reef Aquatics. They had it on sale. I believe they still have a number of buckets.

Tomoko