nmonks
A stroke of the brush does not guarantee art from
Hello Anthony,
Unfortunately, you are making a classic mistake -- assuming that "tonic salt" ("aquarium salt") is the same thing as marine aquarium salt. It isn't. Marine aquarium salt (or salt in the sea) is only partly sodium chloride. It is also hundreds of other things that make the water hard and alkaline as well as salty. Brackish water fish need marine salt mix. This is the stuff sold for marine aquaria, such as Reef Crystals, Instant Ocean, etc.
Tonic salt (aquarium salt) is merely overpriced un-iodised cooking salt. It is essentially a con trick. No freshwater fish needs it. Its use goes back to ancient times (i.e., before the 1980s) when aquarists didn't do water changes because they thought "old water" was best. Sodium chloride reduces the toxicity of nitrate (and to some extent nitrite as well) making old water with high levels of nitrate relatively harmless. This benefit is far outweighed by performing regular water changes, so nowadays no fishkeeping book or writer recommends the addition of salt to freshwater tanks. At the least, you're wasting money, at the worst stressing your fish.
A good idea would be to invest in a nice aquarium book. Read up on water chemistry requirements. That will help you choose species suited to your local water conditions. If you have hard, alkaline water, then livebearers, rainbowfish, and certain cichlids would be the way to go. In soft and acidic water, barbs, tetras, and pretty much everything from South America will work well. Discus generally only do well in soft and acidic water. Angelfish are borderline; while they don't come from the same very soft and acidic waters that discus do, they still prefer a neutral pH with low to moderate hardness.
Mollies can be kept in fresh, brackish, or salt water. However, in freshwater they need to be kept in perfectly clean conditions (very low nitrates, certainly less than 20 mg/l). Otherwise they are prone to fungus and various other diseases. In brackish/salt water they are hardier.
Danios most certainly are not brackish water fish. While they will tolerate the "teaspoon per gallon" salt levels some old school hobbyists recommend, there's absolutely no reason to add salt for their benefit. Of your fishes, the only ones that appreciate the salt are the mollies, and even they would prefer marine salt not cooking salt.
Hence:
Unfortunately, you are making a classic mistake -- assuming that "tonic salt" ("aquarium salt") is the same thing as marine aquarium salt. It isn't. Marine aquarium salt (or salt in the sea) is only partly sodium chloride. It is also hundreds of other things that make the water hard and alkaline as well as salty. Brackish water fish need marine salt mix. This is the stuff sold for marine aquaria, such as Reef Crystals, Instant Ocean, etc.
Tonic salt (aquarium salt) is merely overpriced un-iodised cooking salt. It is essentially a con trick. No freshwater fish needs it. Its use goes back to ancient times (i.e., before the 1980s) when aquarists didn't do water changes because they thought "old water" was best. Sodium chloride reduces the toxicity of nitrate (and to some extent nitrite as well) making old water with high levels of nitrate relatively harmless. This benefit is far outweighed by performing regular water changes, so nowadays no fishkeeping book or writer recommends the addition of salt to freshwater tanks. At the least, you're wasting money, at the worst stressing your fish.
A good idea would be to invest in a nice aquarium book. Read up on water chemistry requirements. That will help you choose species suited to your local water conditions. If you have hard, alkaline water, then livebearers, rainbowfish, and certain cichlids would be the way to go. In soft and acidic water, barbs, tetras, and pretty much everything from South America will work well. Discus generally only do well in soft and acidic water. Angelfish are borderline; while they don't come from the same very soft and acidic waters that discus do, they still prefer a neutral pH with low to moderate hardness.
Mollies can be kept in fresh, brackish, or salt water. However, in freshwater they need to be kept in perfectly clean conditions (very low nitrates, certainly less than 20 mg/l). Otherwise they are prone to fungus and various other diseases. In brackish/salt water they are hardier.
Danios most certainly are not brackish water fish. While they will tolerate the "teaspoon per gallon" salt levels some old school hobbyists recommend, there's absolutely no reason to add salt for their benefit. Of your fishes, the only ones that appreciate the salt are the mollies, and even they would prefer marine salt not cooking salt.
Hence:
- Stop buying salt (and carbon too, another con).
- Decide whether to put the mollies in their own tank with proper brackish water or keep them in freshwater but maintain nitrates very, very low by regular, massive water changes.
- Buy (or borrow) an aquarium book.
- Learn about water chemistry and why different fish need different conditions.
/www.amazon.co.uk/s?ie=UTF8&sear...onks&page=1
