Thinking of switching salts
 

I’ve been using the blue bucket of Red Sea since starting my 180 gal mixed reef almost two years ago but now I’m feeling the itch to switch to Aquaforest's Reef Salt. Is it worth the switch?

What are you hoping to accomplish by switching. Have you seen any recent and relevant ICP analysis comparisons of the two salts?


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Why? RED SEA makes a good salt, a bit pricey, but consider the mix range if the PRO for example.

Mix creates the range that many if us tweak to our own parameters, this can throw off any dosing so be careful. In addition, the stability you currently enjoy may suffer somewhat.

The itch is not a good enough reason to gamble change if the salt you have had worked for you in the past.

Like said, red sea produces good salt.. imho i will not change. Stick to what works for you. I moved from AF probiotic to RS blue tub. Best decision ever.

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I think unless you’re using Top fin from Walmart (even THAT might be fine) it won’t really matter. There are too many great tanks that use every salt in every range to say one makes that much of an impact over another. Matter of fact consistently the BEST looking tanks I’ve seen in the hobby use instant ocean, one of the cheapest salts.


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I agree with these other folks, if you don't have a reason behind it other then just the ich to do something then don't! Your risking upsetting the balance of many unknowns (trace elements for example) that could upset lots of corals.

Conciser me talked out of doing it.

I’ve just seemed to get my parameters where they should be but I’m still not getting growth out of some corals. I thought the lower alk (my RS mixes in the high 8s/ low 9s) might help.

It's ok to be high in the Alk,ca,mg ranges or low, but high or low on all three, not one or the other.....depends on your expectations for growth.

In the end, salt is salt, the difference is what and how much do you have to add to get in the NSW sweet spot and stay there...

I think the odds are low that lower alkalinity will help, but it should be inexpensive and easy to try. Generally, higher alkalinity encourage more growth by making calcium carbonate formation easier, unless the higher alkalinity causes tissue recession, which seems to be possible.

Hard to ever follow Bertoni with advice, but IMHO the key to coral growth is stability. Try to avoid any changes - including salt - without a compelling reason. Benadryl may work for that itch. . .