will phosphates affect snails?

monty

New member
Until I get my RO/DI, i am forced to use tap water in my tank. The fish I have have tolerated it without a problem for quite some time, but i was going to put a big order together for some snails/blue legs. I won't, however, if snails are sensitive to this
 
I wouldn't be concerned about phosphates in your tap water (as far as inverts are concerned), what you should be worried about is copper. Invertebrates will not tolerate copper in your water. Before you spend any money on inverts, get some good water. Does a LFS sell RO water?
 
With all the alge you get by using tap water your snails will be in 7th heaven, that is unless the water has copper.

Go buy distilled water from Walmart 6 gallons for $3.00. You will apreciate it in the long run. When I first started I used tap water and you will have a mess plus your rocks will asorb the excess nutrients and continue to leach them back into your system so when you use the Ro water you still will algae for awhile.

Tap water = algae and more money in the long run
 
I had a phosphate issue when I was using tap water. It did not seem to bother the snails at all. As Akronviper stated, at least they feasted on the algae the tap water created.

I did start using the ro/di and it has made a difference. As akronviper also stated, it took more time to clean up the mess the tap water made...algae, phosphates, nitrates, cyano. I thought it was just easier to use the tap water in the beginning....it certainly wasn't!
 
thanks for the help everyone. I've got the ro/di cranking out water at a snails pace (no pun intended) and plan on doing about a 55gal water change tomorrow night. That, and a couple of those phosphate fighting pads in my sump should bring down the levels enough for a large shipment of snails/bluelegs i have on the way. you are all absolutely correct when saying tapwater isnt easiest in the long run. i stopped using my r/o d/i because it was too much of a pain in the neck to stay on top of since i didnt have any more corals~but, time to get back into it and create a better system. Thanks again!
 
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