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well the benefits are definetely cost. Natural salt water is free and plentiful.
The downfalls... pollutants.
You'll hear from time to time about people using ocean water and just doing pwc's every couple of days with a bucket-full. These same people tend to live on the beach and some don't even use any filtration at all.
Good synthetics are designed to give you all your essential trace elements.
Bummer, cause I could just got to the beach. My LFS also sells natural water, not sure if its cleaned in any way though.
The main reason I ask is that I dont want to shell out for a quality RO/DI just yet, although my tap is good quality compaired to most. Id rather not dechlorinate every week or so when mixing salt.
you can buy a $100 dollar 6-stage RO/DI unit from ebay that will save much hassle and at the end of the day...it's a small price to pay for clean water. $100 is relatively a cheap piece of equipment in the SW world, and would go a long way. You can then have the option of buying a $20 float valve that would make your freshwater top-offs a thing of the past.
I plan on getting one later on when my 60g and sump are done cycleing. Im going to ask if the water there is mixed water or natural next time im in. I need to finish getting all the LR for the 60g before I buy anything like that.
I was told you could use NSW but not from close to shore. Five miles out or something if I remember. Not worth it to me unless you plan on boating a lot! Shore lines are like the ocean's skimmers they collect a lot of crap. Just go to the beach during spring break!
There is also a chance of picking up parasites in the NSW. I thought I read once that the water had to be in the dark for awhile to get rid of these parasites.
I live on the North Carolina coast and was using the universities filtered nsw. I got huge alge blooms and a lot of coraline die off. Everyone that I have talked to since has had more or less the same results. If I were you I would def. spend the money and avoid the future headaches! If you are running a reef tank than you really want to stay away but if you are running a fowlr you may be little better off but like i said i would stay away if i were you!
I am using filtered natural seawater in my 29g at the moment because of convenience, don't have to drive to get RO/DI water or mix salt etc.. I am also starting to notice a die off of coraline algea after 3 weeks for what its worth. Keep in mind that the salinity of natural seawater is usually rather high, around 1.028 or 1.027, although being natural I doubt this is much of a problem just out of the normal aquarium range.
You are absolutely correct. Nobody gets NSW from the shoreline. Almost all NSW is collected from after the shelf break, which varies, but is typically at least a mile offshore.
If NSW is what you're trying to replicate with syn. salt, then why would it be worse? :? I've heard nothing but good things about the benefits of NSW, and if it wasn't so heavy to lug around, I'd buy it myself. All the LFS around me use NSW. Sure, I've also heard about a few small inconsistancies with NSW, but you can't beat it. It's natural & the best. It's where the fish was living when you took it out of the wild.....
Window to the Sea? Len's great. Yup, and almost all LFS around us get thiers from Catalina. Although Jeffs Exotic Fish gets theirs trucked in from San Diego.