What is your Salinity? -Reef Tanks

[b_james]

I have always keep mine around 1.023 - Is this ok?

[Aquattro]

That's a bit low. Natural seawater is about 1.026 on tropical reefs. Most polls I've seen online confirm most people are closer to that value.

[muck]

1.025 - 1.026 for me. :wink:

[christyf5]

1.025 - 1.026 for me. :wink:

ditto :biggrin:

[Ruth]

Same same:biggrin:

[b_james]

Dumb question... could this be why my leather corals have'nt fully opened up as much as they should? As I mentioned in my first post, i have always kept my salinity at around 1.023 with no problems, but then again I have never kept leathers just colts, polyps, mushroom and galaxia.:redface:

[Aquattro]

no, not likely the cause, 1.023 is not far off proper levels, and I can't imagine that your corals would not expand because of it.

[christyf5]

Leather corals can be pretty cranky at the best of times, IMO. Mine only seemed to open up fully for a few days every once in awhile. The rest of the time they were only slightly open or sloughing off tissue :confused:

[Aquaholic]

1.025 for me

[prosnow]

1.025 also

[marie]

I keep my salinity at 34, my specific gravity is 1.025 :mrgreen:

[OCDP]

I keep mine at 1.025.

[DanG]

1.025 here.

[sumpfinfishe]

1.024

[Psyire]

1.025

[FragFactory]

1.026 - 1.027 here

Mike

[b_james]

Well.... looks like Im below average. I think I will slowly raise mine to 1.025

[vanreefer]

1.025-26 for me

[Funky_Fish14]

SG topped off at 1.025, and may go as high as 1.026, evap depending. This is not a dramatic change however.

Chris

[Quagmire]

1.025-26 for me
same

[saltaddict]

Im at 1.023 but I dont have a refractometer. God only know how off the old swing arm is.

[Noj]

Just wondering, to anyone who knows...why is the SG at 1.025+ prefered?

I'm a fisherman and whenever we have to deliver our product alive, we keep the SG between 1.019-1.021. We dont keep it lower to save on money because we use different salt than aquariums. Our prawns have no problem in the tanks and can live in a plastic fish tote (equivalent of about a 65G tank) for 40+ hours with 150-190lbs of prawns inside. The SG levels and temperature are dictated by the company that buys the prawns because those are the perameters of their tanks.

When we measure the SG of the ocean water (taken from approximately 15 feet down) it reads around 1.015-1.018, depending on location of course.

Any explanation or ideas? I'm sure its something simple and i'm just overlooking something obvious.


-Cam

[marie]

Temperature plays a part in measuring sg and salinity. I don't know how much difference it actually does make though :biggrin:

[Quagmire]

Noj,haven't thought of that question in a while but if memory serves me. I believe 1.025 is the average SG with some places lower and others higher.

[Aquattro]

Cam, the value of 1.026 is the average SG of the reefs our corals come from. This value also corresponds to the correct values of Ca (and all other elements, really). Lower salinity means lower everything else (in nature).
I've also tested the water locally and SG is much lower. pH is under 8.0 also, mostly due to FW run off close to land. Can your prawns live in this for a while? Sure. Long term, maybe, but not optimally.

[Noj]

Thanks Brad.

Our prawns are also kept in 35-38 degree farenheit water too. So the SG doesn't need to be optimal because of the amount of oxygen they are actually consuming at those temperatures.

I know the Fraser River plays a HUGE role in how high the SG is between Vancouver Island and the mainland.

The difference between high and low tide within 20-30 miles of the fraser is around 1.012 on flood, and 1.019 on ebb. Pretty remarkable really.

All quite interesting, thanks for the explanation!

[seashells]

Ours sits at 1.025 as well.

doug

[Griffin]

1.024 area on my guage (which i think the guage is alittle low itself as lynn's guage showed my salt higher at 1.026) - although i would like to get a refractometer i figure keep what i have been doing as everything is happy and if i change to something new i will probibly end up screwing it all up :)