I knew it, my leathers are addicted to salt water

[corals b 4 bills]

O.k. I posted this last week, my three leathers folded like a card table-I know "this happens all the time!" yea not to me, for nearly two months. So back tracking, I posted that all three of my leathers went south for quite some time and all my perams were fine, the only difference was I had to switch from real ocean water to instant ocean because my LFS moved. Iv'e used instant ocean for years with o.k. results, but with ocean water my tank was incredible! after the leather incident I knew it had to be the synth water but I couldn't find the real deal, well today I got fifty gallons of the good stuff and poured it in, Guess what? yea within one hour my leathers started to extend their polyps, here are pics from start to today, Is my tank addicted to ocean water?http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/500/81436macro9.jpg http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/500/81436leathers_shedding.jpg http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/500/81436recovering_leathers.jpg http://reefcentral.com/gallery/data/500/81436recovering_leathers2.jpg

[NanoGurl]

Beautiful photos. Maybe your corals are just sensitive to changes. Have you tried RC instead? Maybe you could mix half ocean water and half synthetic for awhile?

Idk I tried goodluck :)

[alan214]

There's clearly a connection to how your leathers respond to natural sea water compared to the synthetic mixes but it's very curious how dramatic the reaction is in your setup. It's commonly known that synthetic salt mixes don't do that great of a job of reproducing the chemical make up of a real reef. Nearly all of the commonly sold salts contain excessive amounts of what the salt makers refer to a "essential trace elements". This and other unnecessary chemicals can prevent a reef tank from reaching it's true potential although most tanks seem to do okay with the man-made mixes.

I suspect there is something amiss with your water paramaters that you may be unable to catch with the standard saltwater tests. Whatever it is, the natural seawater compensates for the problem.

How often do you perform water changes and what percentage do you swap out?

[Scuba Josh]

Your leathers are spoiled brats!!!lol

[corals b 4 bills]

My tank is a 155 bowfront with a thirty gallon sump and a fifteen gallon fuge, I change out 50 gallons every four weeks. I love my leathers and was devistated to think that they were on the verge of dieing. We'll see what happens today.

[Chad Vossen]

lucky... we dont have fresh saltwater anywhere in Minnesota!

[Frick-n-Frags]

:D thread title cracked me up, heh..

[corals b 4 bills]

Aren't I funny!.....O.k. T-minus 60 mins. and counting untill lights kick on, right now there closed. I should know if the polyps will extend soon, hopefully these little buggers will come out and say hi. BTW I now support the use of ocean water natural light and electric cars...............alright maybe not the cars.

[jdk504]

Corals b4 bills -

Do you go directly to the ocean and take water? I ask only b/c I live in Monterey CA and I am practically a few minutes from the waters edge and was thinking of using "natural sea water", but wasn't sure if the hassle of lugging all of the water was worth it. Can you please shed some light on how you go about aquiring your water.

[jwinn]

Don't use ocean water

[jdk504]

Any examples why or why not to?

[corals b 4 bills]

I now get my water from ultimate aquarium in san mateo, The guy said that all they do is filter it and run it through a UV but he may not really know either. aquarium concepts told me that they had bought there water from a company in monterey and they got it straight from the ocean also (filtered of course). If you can find it use it, all day yesterday everything (but the leathers, kind of) were blown up, it's crazy to see everyone happy again.