Beating a Dead Horse Topic..

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greyhoundfan

greyhoundfan

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Dec 10, 2006
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San Diego, CA
I've read through many threads here on this forum and people do or don't keep their dats in brackish water. I have NGTs and from what I've read people have reported that they do well in fresh water.

I went to a LFS today and wanted to pick up dithers for my Dat tank to help get my Dats out of their shell since they still are pretty shy after having them 2 weeks. My water parameters are good, Nitite 0 and Ammonia 0, I don't have a nitrate tester but I guess I should pick one up.

I ask the kid about some fish, I was looking at appollo sharks and redhooks. I told him that I was going to keep them with some dats. He gave me a whole lecture about how dats should only be in brackish water and the fish I wanted wouldn't surivive in brackish water. I told him that many people have done will with Dats in fresh water. He wasn't having any of it. He insisted that I should convert my tank to brackish or my dats will die. I got a little p'd and just walked out of the store.
 
All I can say, is I keep 111 dats in fresh with only 1tablespoon of rock salt per 10g. I think its a myth about being brackish or they might die. But interesting is that when you add some salt....bars become stable and they color up! Try it out.
 
greyhoundfan;1052136; said:
I got a little p'd and just walked out of the store.
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Good for you. Some people read one thing and they think they know everything even though they never kept the fish. All you can do is laugh about it and take advice from people here who really keep dats.
None of mine are in brackish.
 
I convinced my LFS to get their indos and thin bars out of brackish.

It was amazing how much better they looked when the did that.
The silvers do better in brackish water though IME.
 
sinister j;1052154; said:
All I can say, is I keep 111 dats in fresh with only 1tablespoon of rock salt per 10g. I think its a myth about being brackish or they might die. But interesting is that when you add some salt....bars become stable and they color up! Try it out.
Click to expand...


I am curious about adding salt - one table spoon per 10 gallons is what you do for fresh water tanks.
What is the normal ammount added for a brackish tank?
and what is the normal ammount added for a full slat water tank?

I was thinking about adding a little salt for a while now, to help fight disease but never knew the proper ammount to add. Now that you say it helps get them alittle more stable I really want to try it out.

would I get regular salt they sell for salt water tanks?
and are there certain fish that cannot tolerate any salt at all because I have my dats in with other fish and do not want to kill any off (can all fish live in some salt?
 
TCZeli;1052808; said:
I am curious about adding salt - one table spoon per 10 gallons is what you do for fresh water tanks.
What is the normal ammount added for a brackish tank?
and what is the normal ammount added for a full slat water tank?

I was thinking about adding a little salt for a while now, to help fight disease but never knew the proper ammount to add. Now that you say it helps get them alittle more stable I really want to try it out.

would I get regular salt they sell for salt water tanks?
and are there certain fish that cannot tolerate any salt at all because I have my dats in with other fish and do not want to kill any off (can all fish live in some salt?
Click to expand...

You do use regular saltwater mixes for brackish. Sometimes it depends on what salt you're using. For my salt tank I use 1/2 cup per gallon of water. For brackish, I just use my salt mix and dilute it to a 10 to 1 ratio for freshwater to salt.

For specific gravity measurements, I keep my salt at a sg of 1.025 and my brackish at 1.010...but the ranges are:

Saltwater: 1.013 to 1.030
Brackish: 1.00 to 1.013
 
when I had my ngts they lived in fresh and my NTTs and STs live in fresh... I had about 10 ATs that lived and grew in fresh till they got killed by a flowerhorn and 5 star cichlid :screwy:
 
The same think happened to me at a LFS here. I asked the guy what I could put in with my small dats and he started showing me all these brakish fish. Then I told him it was a fresh water tank, and he got mad and said something like "That's the wrong tank for those fish!" and walked away. He was mad at the time, but when I went back after that he was really nice to me. I think he probably did some research and realized he was wrong.
 
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