Curing sea water

[dpetruescu]

What is the safest method of curing sea water?

I was planning gof etting some water from the coast between Montery and Santa Cruz and I was going to cure it for 30 days in the dark.

Is there anything else I should be doing? Or should I just drop the whole idea.

If this would work, could one cycle new tank this way?

Thanks for your help

 

[Len]

Coastal waters are problematic since it's high in pollutants. To safely cure seawater, I'd advise sitting the water in the dark for 2-4 weeks with good circulation. A UV sterilizer is a good tool, and use of carbon and polyfilters are recommended to remove toxins and toxicants. It's a lot easier if you just buy NSW or salt mixes.

 

[dpetruescu]

What about from a nutrient side of things... Does seawater offer nutrients not otherwise available in salt mixes?

If seawater offer nutrients does anybody know how long should a 120g tank be up for it to have a coparable nutrient base?

 

[saltcritter]

I have taken waters from , 10 miles north of LA, Sea off of Huston/Gulf TX, and from waters in Pensicola + Sarisoda FL.

I have taken 80-200gallons from each area.

I have had NO!!!! Problems at all!

I would not dump my water in an established tank, but I did start a 200+galon tank with half sea water and cycled water and had NO!!! problems.

I did test for everything you can test for with Hagen and LaMote kits, but I found NO!!! problems.

If I thought of useing Sea water all the time, I would invest in a VERY! high output UV unit and let the water sit in dark for 3-7 days w/ CARBON filtration.
I do not see what 2-3 weeks will do that the above will not cure.

I see no problems with Sea water, if it is filtered and UVed a bit.

30 gallon drum/trashcan(plastic) or two and the lid on some air and uv for a week will kill anything.

Sea water is what started this hobby, the Salt company's have product to sell.
Get it? :wink:

 

[SPC]

What about from a nutrient side of things... Does seawater offer nutrients not otherwise available in salt mixes?

When you say "nutrients" what are you referring to?
Steve

 

[scavdog]

I use water from the south shore of Boston for one of my systems. It looks fantastic. Some people can be quick to judge, but the system is healthy and a testament to NSW.

I would advise using Ozone as opposed to UV.

Here is my 54 this winter. I will post more recent pics tonight.

Here is a tank that was set up by a local man using NSW. He got me to "believe".

 

[dpetruescu]

Not knowing exactly what I meant a quick search revealed:

"Mass balance equations have shown that the input of the major biologically active nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorous and silicon) to the ocean plays an important role in regulating global oceanic production. Most of these nutrients are terrestrial in origin, finding their way to the oceans via riverine and atmospheric pathways. Once in the marine system, nutrients are made available to biological organisms for primary production either through nutrient-rich water being drawn up from below, or by local regeneration resulting from cell breakdown."

I my own experiments and reading a few articles online, it seems that algae/copepods/fish are easier to grow if cycled water from the tank is used instead of fresh water.

I need to do more research to realy quantify this but on the surface it seems to be the case.

 

[SPC]

"Mass balance equations have shown that the input of the major biologically active nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorous and silicon) to the ocean plays an important role in regulating global oceanic production. Most of these nutrients are terrestrial in origin, finding their way to the oceans via riverine and atmospheric pathways. Once in the marine system, nutrients are made available to biological organisms for primary production either through nutrient-rich water being drawn up from below, or by local regeneration resulting from cell breakdown."

-You get this from feeding the tank.
Steve

 

[Lady Godiva]

I use water from the south shore of Boston for one of my systems. It looks fantastic.

I agree, it does look fantastic!

I am interested in the process of using natural sea water. Could be I am just looking for a good excuse to get to the beach more often :lol: How are you collecting the water you use?

Karen

 

[HARPO]

You could ask the Montery Aquarium, if they have filtered water, for public use. I know that may sound funny, but we get all our water from Scripts Inst. of Oceanography in La Jolla. Scripts makes the water available for anyone. We simply pull up to the filter area and fill a 200 gal. bottle we have mounted on a trailer. We have run test on it, and its perfect.
Bill

 

[HARPO]

Our 200 gal water wagon.