Just started a salt water tank. It's a 40 gallon breeder. Has live sand and dead rock. Not live rock. Has been running for two weeks. Used regular tap water. Is that a total fail? Don't want to start over. Any suggestions ? Thanks in advance.
Starting my first salt water tank, used tap water?? Fail??
- Thread starter hernandez.j91
- Start date
Tap is fine as long as you used dechlor. I use tap for my seahorse/pipefish tank with no problems
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I use regular tap and marine salt for water changes, etc. in my 55g salt tank. Just make sure you test it with a sw testing kit, not fw.
Since you are--wisely--taking your time about getting this up and running, I would put a little aside every paycheck until you can get a RO/DI system. I went the same route you did. I'm on a well so no chlorine issues, the mineral content is good, I figured it would be ok despite what the experienced salties here were telling me.
They were right and I was wrong. I got along ok for about six months after setting up with live rock and sand, and working up through turbo snails and then into three or four fish (this is a 29g tall). Then the problems started creeping up: cyanobacteria mostly. Red goop all over everything. I would get the powder treatment stuff, it would clear up for a couple three weeks then it started in again. Le sigh. Finally gave up, tore it down, sold most everything back to the LFS it came from (for pennies on the dollar of course, which serves me right for being an idiot) and went back to fw only.
It can probably be done. Maybe you have better basic tap water, mineral-wise; almost certainly you are more diligent about water changes and maintenance than I am since it would be almost impossible to be worse.
But just sayin', for a long time happy experience with a salt tank find a way to go DO. You will not regret it.
They were right and I was wrong. I got along ok for about six months after setting up with live rock and sand, and working up through turbo snails and then into three or four fish (this is a 29g tall). Then the problems started creeping up: cyanobacteria mostly. Red goop all over everything. I would get the powder treatment stuff, it would clear up for a couple three weeks then it started in again. Le sigh. Finally gave up, tore it down, sold most everything back to the LFS it came from (for pennies on the dollar of course, which serves me right for being an idiot) and went back to fw only.
It can probably be done. Maybe you have better basic tap water, mineral-wise; almost certainly you are more diligent about water changes and maintenance than I am since it would be almost impossible to be worse.
But just sayin', for a long time happy experience with a salt tank find a way to go DO. You will not regret it.Hmmm would it be better to just do a 50 percent water change and replace it with water from the store?
You may want to replace half the water before putting any more expensive livestock in than crabs and snails. Slow and steady win the race in saltwater tanks. Some Prime or other dechlorinator is recommended. RO/DI is definitely recommended. Depends a lot on what your trying to keep.
John
John
This is only my 2 cents.
If I was in your shoes, I would just drain it and start over. Even though your anxious to get it going, it will just be one thing to cross off the list if you experience issues with corals or algea...you will have the comfort knowing that starting off with tap water is not the source of your problems. I did tap water with prime when I first started and had a host of algea issues in the beginning-Mostly this nastly looking snotty brown diatoms crap which was everywhere for a while. I can't say for sure if it was the tap water or not though.
If I was in your shoes, I would just drain it and start over. Even though your anxious to get it going, it will just be one thing to cross off the list if you experience issues with corals or algea...you will have the comfort knowing that starting off with tap water is not the source of your problems. I did tap water with prime when I first started and had a host of algea issues in the beginning-Mostly this nastly looking snotty brown diatoms crap which was everywhere for a while. I can't say for sure if it was the tap water or not though.
