i looked into collecting from Chincoteague in the summer and according to a few seawater reports it wasnt good… most levels are above the norm or acceptable levels. i would imagine that MD is the same way…
Personally if someone knows a Charter Captain that is your best bet. Ask them to get some water for you when they are out, They should know the water good enough and if their fishing for tuna then most of them go pretty far out. most people if asked would be glad to help out especially since you wouldnt be asking a Captain to go out of his way for the experiment.
I may end up being able to do this as Shawn has said he would help automate as much as possible. We will have to see. I don’t want to do to that much trouble to collect the water. I plan research this a little, but I think I will need to test the water at a few locations before we decide which would be the best to use in the experiment. I don’t want to use water that has been collect miles out to sea because most hobbyist won’t ever have access to this water.
well the only thing i see… is the experiment trying to find out whether the local water can support a reef tank and will it benefit from it or is it gunna test the theory that NSW will do wonders for a tank no matter it’s collection point. I would imagine if getting the NSW off shore was the easiest way to get the water and know that it has a higher purity than that of the local water we may be able to collect ouselves, that would be the best bet. at the very least say it’s proven that NSW does all the great things people say, go from there and start another experiment with local collection points.
now if getting the water from offshore is out of the question then local is all your gunna get.
[quote=“logans_daddy, post:34, topic:2442”]
:TWOCENTS
Three tanks. One NSW topped off with preheated NSW. One tap/artificial salt topped off with tap/artificial. One rodi/artificial tapped off with rodi/artificial.[/quote]
im no chemist/biologist by any means… but if u top off the tank thats running NSW with preheated NSW, how do u plan to control the SG???
wouldnt it be easier just to set up a small tank with NSW, filter it and test it 1st and foremost. (hell, it may not be anywhere close to sustaining the lives of what we keep in our tanks for all we know at this point) then try to add a few creatures… and see how it goes. IF its even possible, and the data is close enough to warrant an experiment of this nature, go from there. just seems like so many r worried about getting so precise with the experiment and data… u dont even know if these things will live in local NSW to begin with…
wouldnt it be easier to set up a tank with NSW, filter it and test it 1st and foremost
and what would determie wether its appropriate? hobby grade test kits? The things that would potentially cause issues are likely things that we can not even test. It matters little if the standard parameters are off slightly because the purpose is not to find an RODI equivalent but rather an alternative that could be suitable in less demanding tanks(IE FOWLR, Softy). I dont think anyone expects the initial NSW parameters to be ideal and i do not think that testing the water will rule out absolutely its potential as a water source for less demanding systems. It is rare for said systems to be maintained at ideal parameters so i belive the method roughly outlined in all the above posts is the best method moving foward. No livestock will be used other than frags of aquacultured colony corals so there is little harm in seeing it through.
well, i think we all can agree that even tho “hobby grade” kits may not be as precise as some are looking for, they can tell us if the water is WAY out of wack. right? and if initial testing for everything that we CAN test for shows major problems, then the whole thing can be canceled.
not trying to start an argument, just thinking that a very small amount of work may prove that the experiment may be for nil. thats all. do what u want.
Everyone gets grumpy because they want ‘their’ ideas to show through. No worries.
Step 1 in this experiment should be collecting some NSW and playing with it, can’t do much else without it and its treatment (settling? mixing? storing? storage time? nothing?) need to be ironed out.
So you’ll get the basic testing you want fishguy. I really can’t figure out why you guys are arguing about testing the NSW, it’s going to happen either way.
So are we going to do this as a committee type thing or are folks going to break off and do their own thing or what?
Ellen where are you planning on collecting water? Can we iron out some places of collection and see who all can collect?
[quote=“IanH, post:47, topic:2442”]
Everyone gets grumpy because they want ‘their’ ideas to show through. No worries.
Step 1 in this experiment should be collecting some NSW and playing with it, can’t do much else without it and its treatment (settling? mixing? storing? storage time? nothing?) need to be ironed out.
So you’ll get the basic testing you want fishguy. I really can’t figure out why you guys are arguing about testing the NSW, it’s going to happen either way.[/quote]
not arguing at all, just made a suggestion. thats all.
What I was envisioning was locating a few different spots that are fairly close to my house and do some initial testing. If the water tests out okay then the next step would be to determine the best way to handle the NSW, use it right away, filter it then store it, ect…
I could post up the results and the group or committee could agree as to which location would be best and how best to treat the water.
Everyone gets grumpy because they want 'their' ideas to show through.
Sorry, not just you, always seems like people are getting so grumpy and snappy for no reason.
are you kidding? i think your reading into things a little too much. fishguy stated his thoughts, i stated mine. there is a distinction between “arguing and grumpiness” and stating opinions and counter opinions. if a thread gets a little to lively or or inappropriate, we have moderators for that very reason!
yeah. we are definitely misssing some key smilies. i mean how many ways do we need to laughoutloud? lOl :-)lol >LOL< YahoO :SPIT) ;D
i appreciate your motivation. keeping the boards civil is a big priority and we will be announcing the two new moderators responsible for this shortly. however, being civil does not mean it has to always be rainbows and unicorns. some people enjoy discussing ideas and debating, others do not. fishguy has a lot of experience which usually entails having a lot of opinions. i have a lot less experience but it does not keep me from having a lot of opinions ;D if a member does not enjoy the “atmosphere” of a thread they can simply not contribute to it. there is no need for members to moderate. when lines are crossed moderators will get involved and enforce board policy. beginning in january, things will be slightly different. the officers will no longer moderate unless its absolute necessary. full autonomy in these matters will be given to the two new moderators. they will be very active and visible on the boards and it will be important for them to gauge the “moods” of threads and ideally get involved before things go to far.
uhhh… i live pretty close to ellen. but the “main” job makes me travel a bit, mainly north. our shop is right off of rt 9 by boscos. i can def. grab water from there, and mahon, and south bowers (in laws live out there…) im pretty interested to see how this turns out myself. lemme know how i can help.
Thanks for the offer. There is a lot of stuff going on right now so i couldnt begin to guess when the first official “reefbusters” will be orgnaized and implemented. Hopefully it will be sooner than later and you can be involved. Thanks again!
[quote=“fishguy9, post:55, topic:2442”]
uhhh… i live pretty close to ellen. but the “main” job makes me travel a bit, mainly north. our shop is right off of rt 9 by boscos. i can def. grab water from there, and mahon, and south bowers (in laws live out there…) im pretty interested to see how this turns out myself. lemme know how i can help.[/quote]
Would you want to take a small sample of the water and test for the basic things? I think that should get us started, the more data the merrier!
You guys, like any member, are more than welcome to do anything on your own and share your data and results with the club. It also doesnt have to be just about this topic but anything. The reefbusters idea, however, is going to be a different beast entirely. This thread was more of an impromptu what if than anything else. We are not even close to officially implenting anything quite yet. We dont even have the overall idea on what we want reefbusters to be completely thought out yet. What i can say is that reefbusters will be very formal, organized, and club sanctioned. Its not important that our findings stand the test of scientific scrutiny as much as it is for the results to be accurate and out methods be respected by our target audience. Im not trying to pee on anyones parade, i encourage anyone to run with their thoughts and ideas, but its going to be a while before the club officially does its first reefbuster experiment.
I think we should use more then just extremely hard softies. If the experiment goes well and the tank did not include any acropora or montipora then you’ll likely have a lot of requests to run the experiment over again for another couple of months with them included. Including them will give more data. I have some green Montipora capricornis to donate to the experiment and might be able to come up with another species.