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Salt comments



Hello All,

I have been reading the salt and planted tanks
discussion recently and thought I'd chime in with my
experience.  I am fortunate to have access to a
professional aquarist in our local aquarium club. 
Several years ago we had a round table discussion on
non-iodized vs iodized salt use in tanks.  This is the
gist of the discussion.  The concentration of iodine
in iodized salt is very low.  The use of iodized salt
in low concentrations such as one tablespoon per
gallon of water is not an issue.  An interesting point
was made - iodine is a salt additive because people
need iodine.  Well, fish use iodine too.

I have used iodized salt in planted tanks for fish
that come from water with light salt concentrations. 
To the best of my knowledge I didn't have any other
problems.  I did have one problem that falls in the
"stupid move of the day" category - I dosed the salt
directly into the tank and it fell on a pot of unknown
crypts before it dissolved.  The crypt didn't
appreciate the salt and melted in quick order.  That
can be remedied by mixing the salt in water and then
adding the solution to the tank.  Another pot of
crypts in the same tank is just fine.  Subsequently,
the fish were acclimated to tap water and I haven't
used salt in a long time.

I don't remember what the original post said, but I
wanted to temper my own comments.  I am not a fan of
adding salt or medications to my tanks.  I won't add
or change anything until I do a series of big water
changes to see if that helps.  

Chris
newellcr at yahoo_com


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