I had been using Reef Crystals, which is relatively nutrient rich. To keep my KH/Alk where I wanted it, I switched to Red Sea Salt rather than Red Sea Coral Pro Salt and was happy with it. Then I could no longer find a seller for the 7 kg bag.
The 22 kg bag is more salt than I want to keep around, so I bought Aquaforest Reef Salt as an alternative and have now done two water changes with it.
My 45 cm cube holds roughly 80 L. I change 20 L once a week, mixing 900 g of salt to aim for a specific gravity of about 1.025.
I did not record the first water change, so unfortunately I have no data from it.
I thought I had recorded it. When I realized I had not, I made sure to take better notes during this water change.
These were the parameters after my last water change with Red Sea Salt:
- NO3: 5–10 ppm
- PO4: 0 ppm
- KH/Alk: 8.8 dKH
- Ca: 410 ppm
Two weeks later, after two weekly water changes with Aquaforest Reef Salt, I measured:
- NO3: 5–10 ppm
- PO4: 0 ppm
- KH/Alk: 9.6 dKH
- Ca: 420 ppm
The other values were about the same. KH/Alk rose from 8.8 to 9.6 dKH, and I measured 10.9 dKH in the freshly mixed water before adding it to the tank.
I did not have time to test the other values in the freshly mixed water. If I were not writing this blog, I probably would not have measured even this much.
It came out lower than Reef Crystals and Red Sea Coral Pro Salt, but higher than regular Red Sea Salt.
I aim for 8–10 dKH, but I ran this tank above 13 dKH for more than a year and a half without problems that I could trace to that number. I have 6 kg left, so I will use it all before deciding anything.
In an earlier post, I compared the listed specs and expected a lower number than 10.9 dKH. Water-change volume, temperature, and other target conditions vary a little from tank to tank, so measuring it in my own tank was still the useful part.
A machine that made water-change water for me would be nice, though.
At least having a blog means even a water change can become something to post about. Maybe that is a good thing? Haha.