I'd be inclined to say, wait on your WC . . . . are you topping off your tank daily (pretty much) with freshwater? There is no law that your tank is going to have all inhabitants die if you wait a few days for a water change until you get proper amounts of everything. In fact, I would say until you read up on risks of using tap or distilled water, to buy already mixed saltwater. It is not the answer or something to do long-term, but I would say you need to read the information and probably should have done so before adding inhabitants to the tank, but since there are get to reading asap.
What May be the Cause of this Algae??
- Thread starter $eaba$$
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what do you mean what was it? I googled many things such as distilles water in FOWLR and many such things and researched it for a while and found out that it should be fine and a lot better than tap water for my FOWLR. I read arguments that both types of waters are good for my type of tank.
but where did you read that it was AS GOOD AS ro/di? There's a difference between distilled being better than tapwater in some aspects. Being better than something that can be bad doesn't mean that it should be considered as something good.
Edit to add that you have to consider the source. There are sources that say a hippo tang can be housed in a 30 gallon tank. There are a lot of bad sources. Before I knew better, and before I had access to this site or any decent books (such as those suggested to you) I used distilled in a 30 gallon and killed quite a few fish. Surprisingly, that stopped after only switching over to RO water. So, I hold that there's something there to be said for that.
Edit to add that you have to consider the source. There are sources that say a hippo tang can be housed in a 30 gallon tank. There are a lot of bad sources. Before I knew better, and before I had access to this site or any decent books (such as those suggested to you) I used distilled in a 30 gallon and killed quite a few fish. Surprisingly, that stopped after only switching over to RO water. So, I hold that there's something there to be said for that.
hmmm I just googled it and looked at tons of the sites and I read almost all saying that distilled was fine for a FOWLR tank... Here are a bunch of links: http://mysaltwateraquarium.wordpress.com/2007/09/07/26/, http://sg.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070928083805AAiEdIO, http://www.reefbuilders.com/forums/introductions-welcomes/825-beginner-saltwater-tank-14-gallons-looking-tips.html, and there was way more. I read on some forums too where people said it was fine and much better than tap water.
oh but did you know about the cycle and those steps back then; it could have been your cycle or something else that killed your fish. I don't think you can be sure it was the water and I don't think you can only blame that... but who knows... Thanks for the help.
Yep, that was pretty much one of the few things I did know about was the cycle and I used my poor clowns I still have 3 years later for it. I wasn't aware of other ways of doing it, but I was aware of the cycle. I'm sure there may have been other issues but the only thing that changed between killing off many many fish besides the 2 clowns that I started with and being able to keep others alive was the water source. So, it is the only thing I can pinpoint.
Many give opinions on the subject but to weigh what is said I recommend knowing why they say it. What is the reasoning behind it? If we don't understand it how are we as fishkeepers going to weigh the advice?
I would agree that it is often better than tap water but I have reasons for why such as phosphates. But why would it be just as good as RODI? Did your sources explain it or just make a statement?
