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have anyone successfull keep coral using tap water.
- Thread starter tvnguyen71
- Start date
i have been using tap water in my setup for almost 2 years now without any problems... i am successfully growing sps and various other corals in my tank ... all i use for filtration is a skimmer somr filter floss and some carbon every other week if you want to look at the water quality report of my provider it is in PDF format here https://www.epcor.ca/NR/rdonlyres/DF588 ... 04_211.pdf
pics of my tank and specs here :
http://reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=60470
pics of my tank and specs here :
http://reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=60470
No one is saying that it is impossible. What we are saying, and what we have BEEN saying in every single solitary thread that ever had this subject come up is this: It is NOT a good idea to advise people to do it, point being that most people who ask are new reefers that do NOT need to be pointed in the wrong direction. Someone who wants to try what bob says will usually be an experienced reefer who knows what is in his tap and what he (or she) is getting into before they go diving head first into something that could possibly cause them to spend an assload of money on dead stuff, and therefore does not need advice on what the hell to do. Furthermore, doing what bob does steers people from developing good reef keeping habitsand discourages people. I am sure that this is not his intention, and is genuinly posting his experiences. Telling people that it is POSSIBLE to have a bad ass tank with no water changes on tap water with crushed oyster shells, and filling up the thread with alot of jargan that they probably dont know, is one thing. However, Telling them that this is what the SHOULD do is a whole other animal. We should all stick to giving them the facts first, and our opinions about what works second and let them add them together after theyve had their own experiences.
Of course, Edmonton Alberta Canada's Tap water ought to be much different from heavily populated city's municpal water, eh?
Guys (and gals....) Nothing is impossible. I even bet there are people keeping koi in raw sewage. But tap water varies. even if your tap water is great now, it may not be a few years down the road. Tap water recipe do change, and some never officially posted them.
Having filtered source water (RO/DI...etc.)is just our way of making sure what we provide to the animals we cared for is in its best condition.
Guys (and gals....) Nothing is impossible. I even bet there are people keeping koi in raw sewage. But tap water varies. even if your tap water is great now, it may not be a few years down the road. Tap water recipe do change, and some never officially posted them.
Having filtered source water (RO/DI...etc.)is just our way of making sure what we provide to the animals we cared for is in its best condition.
Let's assume for a moment that plants or macroalgae actually can remove and sequester toxic elements such as arsenic, selenium, and whatever else might be in tap water. Big assumption, but go with it.
Even if this is true, they don't soak up elements like this instantaneously. It just doesn't happen. So every time you top off, you're exposing your corals to a little bit more arsenic/selenium/whatever until the macroalgae can magically soak it up. For most reefkeepers this means every day. And since corals are incredibly sensitive to some trace elements, that's not something I want to do.
What happens if your algae isn't growing fast enough to sequester these elements? What happens if some of your algae dies, and releases all those concentrated toxins back into the water?
Even if this is true, they don't soak up elements like this instantaneously. It just doesn't happen. So every time you top off, you're exposing your corals to a little bit more arsenic/selenium/whatever until the macroalgae can magically soak it up. For most reefkeepers this means every day. And since corals are incredibly sensitive to some trace elements, that's not something I want to do.
What happens if your algae isn't growing fast enough to sequester these elements? What happens if some of your algae dies, and releases all those concentrated toxins back into the water?
:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:beaslbob":u6wev1xl said:As I have stated numerous time, plant life will condition the water to natural sea level values.
I use Tap water, when i set up my first reef tank before i new about RO/DI and alk and ca, All i did was use some dechlorinator in the water mixed up some IO salt and did weekly water changes My tank thrived! Got to learning more about reefing and all these "experts" said GOT to use RO.DI tap water is no good blah blah blah, well i went the RO/DI route My tank suffered, looked horrible, very little coralline and ph very unstable. went back to tap water and IO salt and guess what? the Tank is thriving again stable ph and mad corraline. I did get the EPA test results of my city's water and i Do test it for chlorine and choriamines, NO3 NH4, Cu and Si and using the hobby grade test kits all levels are zero. So if your water passes these test and you can get a GOOD accurate EPA water quality report I say go for it. The true test is how YOUR tank looks and responds. All i use my RO/DI water for now is in my coffee maker, my iron, and to dilute the radiator fluid and washer fluid in my ride. Once in a blue moon i will use it to clean up salt creep from time to time.
I have an old 5.5g that I'm basically keeping alive so i can give the LR and sand to a fellow reefer when he starts his tank. I have been lazy and don't want to deal with RO for just this tank, so I've just been topping it off and doing WC's with tap water. Besides live rock the tank also has one of those electric blue marshall island hermit crabs, a branching trumpet coral and two red ricordia polyps and a tiny bit of xenia that was detached from a larger rock. All corals and the crab are fine.
I've been using conditioned tap water (I use Prime) for as long as I've been keeping aquariums. This made a lot of sense when I started, since I was keeping freshwater tanks with cichlids. Cichlids will live in all kinds of crappy water conditions; so I didn't sweat it.
When I made the plunge to saltwater, I just kept using tap water. My local fish store guy said it'd be fine. That reef is four years old now and thriving. I moved it from the 55gallon tank it had been in to a brand new 100gallon this summer, but I brought most of its water with it. I am still using conditioned tap water. I should get some pictures and specs up sometime soon, I guess; for some general data points here, though, I keep hard and soft corals with a few fish and a lot of invertebrates, don't have a refugium to speak of, and run a protein skimmer 24x7.
So, yeah, it can be done. Now, that being said, I have to say that I have been thinking on and off over the years about whether I should switch to a better water source and the most convincing thing I've heard about this was earlier in this thread when someone was pointing out that, while your tap water may be fine now, you have no control over how and when it changes in the future and the city (or whoever is responsible for your tap water) does not have to announce changes before or after they make them (except in certain circumstances). This has given me quite a bit of pause.
When I made the plunge to saltwater, I just kept using tap water. My local fish store guy said it'd be fine. That reef is four years old now and thriving. I moved it from the 55gallon tank it had been in to a brand new 100gallon this summer, but I brought most of its water with it. I am still using conditioned tap water. I should get some pictures and specs up sometime soon, I guess; for some general data points here, though, I keep hard and soft corals with a few fish and a lot of invertebrates, don't have a refugium to speak of, and run a protein skimmer 24x7.
So, yeah, it can be done. Now, that being said, I have to say that I have been thinking on and off over the years about whether I should switch to a better water source and the most convincing thing I've heard about this was earlier in this thread when someone was pointing out that, while your tap water may be fine now, you have no control over how and when it changes in the future and the city (or whoever is responsible for your tap water) does not have to announce changes before or after they make them (except in certain circumstances). This has given me quite a bit of pause.
chances are any serious changes in your water chemistry you will know about. what i do is go to the epa test results for water in my area. They do have a regualr testing schedule so i watch it. Basically if it aint broke dont fix it. You will get the camp claiming toxic metals and trace elements in tap water that build and evenutally cause your tank to crash. I seriously doubt it. reefers these days are so anal about chemicals in their tanks that they even worry about reaching in the tank after handling change!! LOL . I have seen threads about not using sea water because it is polluted or "processing" sea water before putting it your tanks. Yet we strive to duplicate the chemistry of sea water and at the same time shun the use of the very material we spend so much time and money trying to duplicate. go figure.
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