salt affecting water?

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assortedsorts

assortedsorts

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Sep 17, 2007
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I am converting my fw to bw slowly for my gsp...I did a dip test on my water last week and it came up showing very little nitrate and no nitrite..well today it is now showing a WHOLE LOT of nitrate and nitrite...my question is can marine salt mess with the water chemistry like that?
 
The beneficial bacteria that live in highly brackish or salty water are different than the bacteria that live in freshwater or saltwater. By adding salt, you may be killing off the freshwater bb that are in the tank. You'd never put live rock in a FW tank and expect it to work, but sometimes brackish can be confusing because it's kind of fresh, and kind of salt. I would cycle this tank the same way you'd cycle any other after it becomes fully brackish. Unfortunately, since your puffer is already in the tank, it may take a lot of water changes.
 
well it was fully cycled (for 2-3 months) before I started adding salt, I think I may have added it too fast though..I had been using my hydrometer wrong. I figured it out and i'm at 1.008sg right now.
 
IMO, the tank is going through a mini-cycle. I would keep doing water changes at the same spec grav until you feel it's safe to start adding more salt. And then, as you've figured out, do it slowly! I hope someone else chimes in here who has more experience with brackish, and puffers, specifically, but I hope the little bit of info I had helped.
 
ya the bio filter can adapt, the axact same thing happend in my GSP tank, it because the bacteria cant feed when they are dieing of and adapting to the chage of SG. they can adapt to a change of sg.002 at atime. so im stable at sg.008 i will raise it to sg.010 in a few months when i do water changes i have one bucket and ensure each bucket is at the same sg as the tank. maney people say its good to shange the sg for brackish species with each water change but i like to keep it the same so i dont mess with the bio filter. i figure my GSP is happyer with no ammonia and nitrites and a stable sg
 
you can move up to 0.002 sg per week. no more than that otherwise you will experiace what is happening. the fish can cope with the rapid changes in salinity, but he beneficial bacteria cant. its not a problem in esturine environments, as they basically get a constant waterchange so any waste is carried away, but in a sealed environment like an aquarium, waste can build up. and thats what kills fish.

like i said no more than 0.002 per week. less is better. just keep any eye on your fish. if he gets a black stomach check your water and/or do a waterchange at the same SG.
 
yeah, I don't know if you saw my other thread about my floating hydrometer...well I was usuing it wrong...so I was just adding a few tablespoons a day...then it didn't change so I was like ok well I guess I can add more than that a day...plus the salt I got said half the bag would make a 5 gal full salt and there was a WHOLE LOT of salt...so then I realize I am using the hydrometer wrong and when I take it off I am already at .008 :s
 
you'll be fine. just keep an eye on your params. do water changes when needed...
 
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