froggiegal

I don't want to cause any burns, how do I dissolve aquarium salt in water changes?

pinkfloydpuffer

Usually aquarium salt isn't recommended anymore. But I think that if you are going to use it that you should mix it well and maybe even let it dissolve overnight or something.

sirdarksol

If you are going to use it, just mix it in a bucket before moving it to the tank.

However, you don't have any tanks you should be using salt in. Cories and plecos are extremely sensitive to salt, and it will stress them.

froggiegal

Thank you guys...I may have really screwed up. We'll see what happens - can't believe everything you read.

I'll do another water change in the a.m. - dumb....

sirdarksol

No worries. It used to be a very common thing to use in all tanks, and some people still swear by it (though most of these people are long-time aquarists who have not changed their tactics even though the hobby has progressed a lot in the past twenty years).

Even my favorite aquarium book suggests using aquarium salt.

I base my beliefs in this matter partially on the advice of CWC and Dino, two members who have a lot of fishkeeping experience (not to mention one of them has, I believe, a biology degree and I know one of them almost has a chem minor), and partly on my own understanding of osmosis, cells, and different fishes' natural habitats.

pinkfloydpuffer

Yeah, I bought some aquarium salt when I got my first freshwater tank, and then immediately after discovered that I didn't need it. So now I've got a little carton of unopened aquarium salt sitting in my room. Maybe I can find another use for it...

froggiegal

The good thing is that at least I did not add salt to the whole tank. It was the 10 gallon water change I did. This is a new tank that apparently hasn't cycled completely as I've lost 1 cory and 2 blue German Rams. I am adding conditioner to the water change to get rid of the chlorine. I may have another one of the Rams in distress. I looked all over for Tetra Safe Start and for Bio Spira and it's no where to be found around here. My other two tanks appear to be okay....thanks for your help.

clinton1621

Aquarium salt will also kill live plants... so definitely dont put it any tank that has live plants.

You can try using Seachem Stability... it doesnt work as well as Safe Start or Bio-Spira, but it does help more than using nothing. Just dont get the stuff called Cycle... otherwise you have to keep using it forever in the tank.

froggiegal

Well, thanks to you guys, I did not use Cycle. My hubby brought it home and I asked first b4 I did anything! I'll look for the Seachem Stability tomorrow - maybe on my lunch hour.

sirdarksol

Depends on the plants. Some plants can adjust to brackish water. (My brackish tank is one of my most heavily planted tanks).
But yes, most plants will die pretty quickly after the addition of salt.

froggiegal

Hello Guys,

Just a quick update...after posting on Wednesday, I expected to wake up on Thursday and find all my fish DEAD! The fish have survived my stupidity... As a matter of fact, the remaining German Blue Ram is quite sturdy and is swimming all over the place. I had to move 3 Metae corys into this 50G as my betta decided she didn't want tankmates! They are loving the 50G and have mixed well with the other Corys. Not planning on adding any more fish until I am positive this tank has cycled fully. Thanks for your help - I'll have to use the salt I bought on home-made pretzels...

sirdarksol

I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make it sound that bad. It usually takes the salt days or weeks to kill the more sensitive fish, and it simply weakens the hardier ones.

froggiegal

Sirdarksol,

Thanks for your input. The first thing I should have done was check on the forum for everyone's advice. It's a lesson well learned. Not doing that again. To be honest, I think I'm the only person on the boards who's looking for nitrite to show up so I KNOW that the tank has FINALLY cycled! So, I will continue to check the water and continue to *keep my fingers crossed* that the little guys in the tank will be OKAY.
Thanks, again.

clinton1621

Remember, nitrite is only the second stage... for a fully cycled tank you need readings of 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, and between 5 - 20 nitrates =)

Also nitrate levels can vary due to algae or live plants, in which case they may not even show up even in a cycled tank... I have pretty much 0 nitrates because I have a lot of live plants.

froggiegal

Hi Clinton,

Appreciate that information. Right now I'm exhibiting a touch of ammonia - I'll have to do a water change when I get home tonight. the Nitrites have been 0 all along - no elevation on the Nitrates. What's confusing to me...if I do a water change, won't I be keeping the tank in a mini-cycle because I am continually adding fresh water (with conditioners)? If I don't do the water change, will the ammonia then convert into the N to N?

But, then if I don't do a water change, won't some of the fish die? My last GBR is having difficulties breathing. Thanks for your help.

sirdarksol

Doing the partial water change slows the cycle, but this is necessary to keep the fish alive. As long as you don't change all the water at once, there will still be a little bit of ammonia in the tank, which will feed the growing colony. Then, over the next day, the fish are continuing to produce ammonia, which continues to feed the colony. You do a water change, it takes some (but not all) of the ammonia out of the water, and the process continues.

froggiegal

Hi Sirdarksol,

I just finished doing a water change - took out around 10 gallons. I'll see how the tank reads tomorrow morning. If it still reads higher in ammonia than I would like, I'll do another 10 gallon change again.

Thanks for your help.

Fishies-for-me

Why don't you take 1/2 of the filter material out of the older tank you have and put it in the filter of the new tank...that will greatly speed things along. I killed my cycle ( or at least part of it as I didn't get nitrites) by using trisulpha for fin rot....I had a ammonia spike of 2 ..I put sponges in from the filter of another tank and in 2 days had no ammonia!!!

froggiegal

Hi Fishes,

Thanks for the suggestion. I actually did that so that I had one new and one old filter in my cichlid tank and in the new 50G. BUT, I may consider now taking the old filter from the cichlid and swapping it for the newer filter in the 50G and see where that takes us! Actually, when I go to my LFS this weekend, I hope to buy sponges for my older Whisper filter that didn't come with them. Thanks for your input.

froggiegal

Hi Fishies,

I actually did that...had one new filter and one old filter in each of my tanks. What I may do is take the second old filter from the cichlid tank and put it in the 50G - that should definitely do the trick! I'll let you know. Thanks for the input.

froggiegal

Hey Fishies,

I thought I had replied, sent another reply not realizing the thread went into page 2.

What a day!

Fishies-for-me

I was wondering why..I even checked the time to see if you had accidentally double posted...but then just figured that info was sooo valuable it needed to be looked at twice...lol