Salinity To High

[pookie]

Thank you for your help

 

[Eigdoog]

water change?

 

[Aqua Duck]

I assume you're working in parts per million (ppm)? If so 30 is too low. Ideally you want to be getting a reading of 35 ppm.

 

[CageUK]

Just take some of the salt water out and replace it with plain RO water.

Do this in small stages so that you can:
a) monitor the levels as you go and adjust accordingly.
b) avoid stressing the inhabitants (if any).

Also ensure that your salinity really is out of wack! If you are using a hydrometer, try to get it checked with a known accurate source like a refractometer possibly from your LFS.

Cheers

 

[pookie]

I litrally just put the water in 2 days ago and have had everything going for this period. The gentleman at the shop said the water was right and using a hydrometer should be between 27PPT and 33PPT. Its at just under 36. He also said that the specific gravity should be between 1.020 and 1.024 to be safe.

This is my first marine aquarium and I want to get it right.

I cant seem to find anything on the forum.

Just take some of the salt water out and replace it with plain RO water.

Do this in small stages so that you can:
a) monitor the levels as you go and adjust accordingly.
b) avoid stressing the inhabitants (if any).

Also ensure that your salinity really is out of wack! If you are using a hydrometer, try to get it checked with a known accurate source like a refractometer possibly from your LFS.

Cheers

"RO Water" ???

Now I will really sound thick

 

[Musho3210]

the ocean is between 1.025-1.027 on average. 36ppt is nothing to worry about.

Have you been topping off with fresh RO/DI water? If not, thats probably why the SG is higher than when you first started.

 

[CageUK]

I litrally just put the water in 2 days ago and have had everything going for this period. The gentleman at the shop said the water was right and using a hydrometer should be between 27PPT and 33PPT. Its at just under 36. He also said that the specific gravity should be between 1.020 and 1.024 to be safe.

This is my first marine aquarium and I want to get it right.

I cant seem to find anything on the forum.

"RO Water" ???

Now I will really sound thick

RO is Reverse Osmosis water. It is water that has undergone special filtration to have as many of the impurities as possible taken out of it. It is used as a basis for making our synthetic sea water.
Your LFS (local fish supplier) will be able to sell you RO water, normally in 25ltr containers. You then simply substitute some of the salt water for the RO water.
As has already been mentioned though you aren't too far out so I wouldn't worry too much at this stage. You will need to ensure that your live rock is cycled before putting any marine life in there and at that stage you will be doing a largish (50%ish) water change so you can make any corrections then.
Also as the water in the tank evaporates, it needs to be topped up with plain RO water and not salt water. The water evaporates but the salt stays in the tank so topping up with salt water will increase the salinity.
So you can see that even if you are buying your salt water from your LFS, you will still need to buy RO water as well for top ups.

Good luck!

Cheers

 

[pookie]

I litrally just put the water in 2 days ago and have had everything going for this period. The gentleman at the shop said the water was right and using a hydrometer should be between 27PPT and 33PPT. Its at just under 36. He also said that the specific gravity should be between 1.020 and 1.024 to be safe.

This is my first marine aquarium and I want to get it right.

I cant seem to find anything on the forum.

"RO Water" ???

Now I will really sound thick

RO is Reverse Osmosis water. It is water that has undergone special filtration to have as many of the impurities as possible taken out of it. It is used as a basis for making our synthetic sea water.
Your LFS (local fish supplier) will be able to sell you RO water, normally in 25ltr containers. You then simply substitute some of the salt water for the RO water.
As has already been mentioned though you aren't too far out so I wouldn't worry too much at this stage. You will need to ensure that your live rock is cycled before putting any marine life in there and at that stage you will be doing a largish (50%ish) water change so you can make any corrections then.
Also as the water in the tank evaporates, it needs to be topped up with plain RO water and not salt water. The water evaporates but the salt stays in the tank so topping up with salt water will increase the salinity.
So you can see that even if you are buying your salt water from your LFS, you will still need to buy RO water as well for top ups.

Good luck!

Cheers

THank you very much for your help. I'm really looking forward to getting a couple couple of cleaner shrimp and 2-3 small clwn widh. I all ready have around 5 kilo of living rock in there

 

[CageUK]

THank you very much for your help. I'm really looking forward to getting a couple couple of cleaner shrimp and 2-3 small clwn widh. I all ready have around 5 kilo of living rock in there

You must ensure though that your live rock has fully cycled before adding anything. This means that the live rock is not producing any poisonous ammonia or nitrites. You will need test kits to specifically test for ammonia, nitrites and nitrates at the very least.

The readings for both ammonia and nitrites must be consistantly zero before you can add anything. Once this has happened you will most likely get an algae bloom (lots of algae all over the tank) and at this stage you do the large water change 50% or so to reduce the nitrates which will have been increasing, and then you can add your clean up crew...shrimp, hermits and snails etc. They will get to work on the algae and after a week or so you can think about adding one or two small fish. You need to try to keep your nitrates to below 10ppm if possible if you are looking to create a reef tank. Not quite as important if you only intend to stock fish and no corals but high nitrates will increase the possibility of excess algae.

The fact that you only have 5kg of live rock leads me to believe you only have a small tank (nano) so you must research carefully before you add stock to your tank. There are numerous topics on the forums and the pinned topics contain a wealth of knowledge.

Cheers

 

[Musho3210]

All well said, you need to make sure you top off on a daily or bi-daily basis if you have a nano tank. If its too much for you, you can buy some auto top off units out there.

 

[pookie]

Thanks to everyones knowledgable words. I am in no rush and have had the tank cerculating now for the last 3 days. I'll get the testing kits and advice from the shop pro.

I'll make sure everything is going well and keep you informed.

All the best

 

[@ombomb]

you may be lucky with your fish shop, but generally it wouldn't rely on the advice of people working in shops, it can range from horribly out-dated to wildy inaccurate

do as much of your own research as possible, you should be able to get a fairly good idea of whether they're a reliable source fairly quickly. don't get me wrong, they are some fantasitcally knowledgable people who work in fish shops, they're just seem to be few and far between.