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3. Water Additives
Salt :
It is important, as we have seen, to use the right type of water to start the aquarium, top-off to compensate for evaporation, and make water changes. It is also very important that after the tank is up and running, that the additives that are needed are added, and that the right kind of salt is used to prepare the water for the Reef tank.
If we are going to dispense with fancy equipment, and we are, then let's at least make sure that we cover all other required steps, to improve the water quality, and do so with the best products we can get. Don't economize in the wrong areas ! If you try to, you will be making the wrong decisions, and your aquarium and your animals will suffer.
You will be using salt for as long as you keep your tank, and salt can make up a large portion of the money you will need to spend on the aquarium. This leads many Hobbyists to buy the cheapest salt avail- able. That is, in my opinion, a real big mistake.
Scuba divers amongst you will easily understand the following analogy : when you refill your air tanks, you want the best and cleanest "air" you can get . Your life depends on it, doesn't it ? Your corals and fish feel the same about the water and the salt you use. Their life depends on it. So use the best quality you can get; your tank will look better, and you will have far less problems. It would cost you much more to replace fish and invertebrates, than what you can save on salt and additives.
Fish-only tank salt is of excellent quality, but may contain impurities that you do not want in your "Reef" tank. I am especially talking about nitrates and phosphates . I cannot give evaluations of individual salts in a book, as I am sure you realize. I can, however, give you a test that you can use to determine whether or not the salt you are now using, or are planning to use, fits the quality picture I just indicated :
- mix up a batch of water with that salt,
- let the mixture stand for a few hours,
- stir once in a while, or run an airstone in the mixture,
- test for nitrates and phosphates,
- if you find any of either, try a different salt.
If you find that the salt you are now using, or plan to use, contains impurities such as nitrate and phosphate, my recommendation is that you try another salt. Why add compounds that you will have to go to great length to remove ? I ask you, why ? Especially since removing them can be quite difficult and an expensive proposition on top of it.
For obvious reasons we use Tech-Reef-Salt, an ultra pure mixture of all the elements needed, and trace elements required. You may wish to alternate its use with another less expensive salt. I personally like Hawaiian Marine Mix a lot, but there are other fine salts that fit the picture as well.
Alternatively, use a mixture that you make up yourself, of Tech Salt and another salt, in a certain proportion. For example, a mix of 25 (resp. 33) per cent of one and 75 (resp. 67) percent of another one, is an excellent solution, will improve the overall quality, and will not cost a lot more than what you are doing now.
Mix the salt and the water several hours before you plan to use it. This will allow the mixture to stabilize itself, and all the components of the salt to dissolve properly. In this fashion your redox potential will also not be affected as much when you change water. Indeed, raw water (just prepared) can alter your redox potential easily by more than 100 millivolt. I have seen it happen many times. If you prepare the new water beforehand, and let the solution sit for a few hours, while aerating it, the effect will not be as drastic.
If you would like to try Tech-Reef-Salt, send us a check for fifteen dollars, including freight and handling, before Sep. 30, 1990 and a note asking for a small sample, enough for a 10 gallon water prep- aration, and we will gladly send it to you. This is genuinely a special salt, made to the highest specifications I can expect a manufacturer to hold himself to in making a product for us. No phone orders please. No cash on delivery either. Only by mail. Valid only in Continental United States.
There are many theories about adding trace elements. Some say that the amount contained in the salts you use is plenty, and that you therefore do not need to supplement. That does not make much sense to me. Skimmers, ozonizers, and the lifeforms in the tank, continuously remove trace elements, especially the algae, both micro and macro.
Moreover, trace elements are removed in unequal amounts. Some disappear faster from the water than others. Which ones are depleted more, depends on many factors, including what type of macro-algae you grow, and what type of invertebrates you keep. Peter Wilkens, the well known German author has written extensively about this, even to the point where his experimental findings totally contradict what some avant garde German manufacturers say.
It makes a lot of sense, therefore, to use an additive to replenish such trace elements from time to time. More frequently if you skim heavily, e.g. when using the newer Venturi valve operated foam fractionators, or efficient columnar ones, operated with ozone.
How much of an additive you should use depends on the type of additive you have bought. Follow the directions of the manufacturer in this respect. Be aware, too, that most of their recommendations are on the conservative side.
Because there are no "tests" available for trace elements, no one can actually check their levels. The recommendations made are, therefore, based on personal experiences and the experience of other well known Hobbyists and researchers.
Moe (1989) expounds on the subject in The Marine Aquarium Reference, his new book, referred to several times already. Wilkens, known to most of you, is pretty clear about having to add elements to his tanks, to maintain invertebrate s and corals alive and in vibrant condition. Many others before me have said so too. This is not something new, it has been around for a long time, just not highlighted often enough.
All the recommendations made in this book, and others I have written, are not meant to make you spend more money yet, but are truly meant to allow you to keep a Reef tank that will give you pleasure, and where your investment in animal life remains alive for long periods of time. Much longer than what many of you have been accustomed to, especially since we are running a basic system.
The cost of a few good additives, this one and others mentioned later, is far less, than continuously having to buy new anemones, elegance corals, sunflower corals, etc. Replacing animals and fish can get very very expensive. Do a little preventative investing, and you will fare a lot better in the long run. And besides, you will do a little too to preserve the reefs, and reduce collecting of the animals you like to keep.
If you were able to duplicate the food chain that exists around the Reef, you would obviously not need any additives whatsoever, including vitamins. You and I know that we cannot do that, yet, anyway.
Vitamins are an important constituent of the foods that corals and invertebrates live off around real reefs. Different lifeforms have different requirements, not all of them well known in fact. Many have been identified, many are still not documented, or only partially so.
Mixtures of vitamins, amino acids, micro-nutrients, pigments, organic elements, and other compounds that are part of a normal food chain, are marketed. I suggest that you use them. Add them directly to the tank, or better perhaps, mix them with the food before you actually add the food to the reef aquarium. This is especially so if you use a good foam fractionator and an ozonizer. And many of you are.
There are several brands that are widely available nationwide and in Canada. Vita-Trace, Coralife and Vita-Chem are but the better known ones.
Be careful not to add too many vitamins at once if you use a protein skimmer. Some brands make the protein foam fractionator skim more strongly. As with any additive, add it regularly, in small amounts. Best is to add it by means of a drip system, in diluted form, or by means of a dosing pump. Thiel (1989) describes this in detail in Advanced Reef Keeping Made Simple (I), and also in The Marine Fish and Invert Reef Aquarium, his other book, all published by Aardvark Press.
Many foods already contain additional vitamins. Such is the case of, for example, the Coralife line of foods, Reef Smack Melange, my own company's dry food, and others as well. Does this allow you not to use vitamin supplements? That is a very hard question to answer, indeed. My suggestion is that you use both food and vitamins made by the same manufacturer, and then follow the directions they provide. Again, and I know I am repeating myself, protein skimmers and ozone remove many elements from the water, including vitamins.
Does it pay to change vitamin brand from time to time ? No con- clusive data on such switches are available as far as I can tell, and I have, personally, not been able to notice any difference in my own tanks when doing so. Get a good brand and stick with it. Use it regularly, and increase the recommended dosage somewhat if you are strongly ozo- nizing. You can not overdose any way. Look for brands that contain a wide range of all known vitamins. Buy only products that look fresh when you get them, and smell like vitamins. Stick with established brands, since they have been around for a few years, they obviously must be doing something right !
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