Natural sea water vs instant sea water

rudedog · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 7

I've had freshwater aquarium for years with no problems. I'm ready to
switch to salt water. I purchased the necessary equipment and
supplies. Ocean salt in bags, Wet/Dry filter, skimmer, sand (store
bought)hydrometer, hi ph test kits and powerheads. I will be using a
55 gallon tank. I live close to the ocean. Is there any problems if I
go ahead and get ocean water VS purchasing sea salt and do my mix. How
about water changes. Can I use ocean water? How about sand and rocks
from the ocean?

Thanks
Rudy

Archived from group: rec>aquaria>marine>misc

rudedog · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 7

Hmmmm. season? I guess I better start going to the archives on how to
season....

thanks
Rudy

George Patterson · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 241

rudedog wrote:
>
> I live close to the ocean. Is there any problems if I
> go ahead and get ocean water VS purchasing sea salt and do my mix. How
> about water changes. Can I use ocean water? How about sand and rocks
> from the ocean?

Yes, you can use stuff straight from the sea. The main problem you will have is
the possibility of pollution if you take your water from close to shore. Don't
introduce too much of the sand and rocks at any one time. They may be harboring
various little critters. If these then die in the tank, the water quality may
become so poor that your other livestock dies. This is why people "season" live
rock and sand.

George Patterson
Give a person a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a person to
use the Internet and he won't bother you for weeks.

kim gross · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 22

rudedog wrote:
> I've had freshwater aquarium for years with no problems. I'm ready to
> switch to salt water. I purchased the necessary equipment and
> supplies. Ocean salt in bags, Wet/Dry filter, skimmer, sand (store
> bought)hydrometer, hi ph test kits and powerheads. I will be using a
> 55 gallon tank. I live close to the ocean. Is there any problems if I
> go ahead and get ocean water VS purchasing sea salt and do my mix. How
> about water changes. Can I use ocean water? How about sand and rocks
> from the ocean?
>
> Thanks
> Rudy
>
Rudy,

Natural ocean water is the best for your tank, as long as the water is
not poluted or diluted from near shore areas. It is best if you can go
out a mile or so from shore to collect it.

as for the sand and rock, really depends on where you are at. If you
are in the tropics, you should be fine, but from more temperate areas it
is not really a good idea because the main reason you want live sand and
rock is for the life on/in them. And if the life you have is temperate
life, it might not survive at tropical tempuratures so you will end up
with dead sand and rock anyway.

Also on your supplies you talk about a wet dry, what are you planing on
putting in your tank? If you are planning on a reef tank, I would
suggest you skip the wet dry completely.

Kim

rudedog · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 7

Kim,

I go tuna fishing all the time. I go about 10-40 miles out
depending on the boat I use. I guess I'll be collecting sea water
every time I go out. I have several 5 gallon buckets. I'm only doing
FOWLR. Hmmmm, I just started cycling my tank. Can you tell me if I
used fresh ocean water for the entire 55 gallons, would I have to cycle
my tank??? Also how long will the water be good for since I can get
about 5 to 6 buckets only. That's about 3 water changes only. I guess
I better do some serious tuna fishing from now on. LOL. Thanks for
the input.

Rudy

Pszemol · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 643

"rudedog" wrote in message @g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> Also how long will the water be good for since I can get
> about 5 to 6 buckets only. That's about 3 water changes only.

Unfiltered water straight from the sea will have a lot of live plankton
swimming in it, so if you restrict oxygen all these critters die polluting
heavily water. When you bring water for storage filter it through
several plankton collectors and put live plankton into the fish tank
for fish to eat it. Do not leave it in the storage container to rot.
Store only filtered water - as a last stage of filtering you can use fine
coffee paper filters to remove almost everything but unicellular algae.
Even these algal cells will die over time so your water will decay.
But without any filtering it would be very smelly next day already.
Give it a try.

kim gross · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 22

rudedog wrote:
> Kim,
>
> I go tuna fishing all the time. I go about 10-40 miles out
> depending on the boat I use. I guess I'll be collecting sea water
> every time I go out. I have several 5 gallon buckets. I'm only doing
> FOWLR. Hmmmm, I just started cycling my tank. Can you tell me if I
> used fresh ocean water for the entire 55 gallons, would I have to cycle
> my tank??? Also how long will the water be good for since I can get
> about 5 to 6 buckets only. That's about 3 water changes only. I guess
> I better do some serious tuna fishing from now on. LOL. Thanks for
> the input.
>
> Rudy
>

You will still have to cycle the tank, since you need the bacteria to
grow on your rock. One bad thing about using ocean water is if you do
not use it quickly there is a lot of plankton in it, which can die and
cause problems. If you can't use the water within 24 hours our so, you
will want to put it in a dark room with no circulation for a week or to,
and then filter out the stuff on the bottom of your buckets, or use a
really fine filter to run the water through to filter out all of the
plankton.

Kim

George Patterson · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 241

rudedog wrote:
>
> Can you tell me if I
> used fresh ocean water for the entire 55 gallons, would I have to cycle
> my tank???

Yes. The water doesn't contain much in the way of nitrifying bacteria -- they
generally live in the substrate, live rock, or in something like a wet/dry filter.

George Patterson
Give a person a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a person to
use the Internet and he won't bother you for weeks.

Billy · Joined: 16 Aug 2007 Posts: 210

"rudedog" wrote in message @g14g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> Hmmmm. season? I guess I better start going to the archives on how
> to
> season....

Commonly refered to as "curing" as well.
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/pic/article.cfm?dept_id=0&siteid=6&acatid=388&aid=851

billy