Does anyone do it? Seriously, do they?

[Amphibious Wallet]

After the last year, can you honestly say any manufacturer can really be trusted at this point?

My skepticism and mistrust runs far deeper than my recent introduction to this hobby lol, or any hobby for that matter.
If I don't know what is in a product and cannot glean specifics from the manufacturer/supplier, for my own personal curiosity if nothing else, it doesn't exist to me.
I will likely die on that hill out of spite someday.
What specifics are you referring to?

Also, I am a tightass, not sure if that has anything to do with it

 

[Icryhard]

How would one go about in proving "better coloration" based on statistics? You want to measure the color of a coral? At best they could provide you with pictures and videos, which in this day and age will also be dismissed due to the amount of stuff we can do.

 

[Reefer Matt Verified Media Partner]

Maybe a good start is for someone respected in the hobby to set an example by showing how unnecessary a lot of the products are. Someone who isn't selling or promoting any products.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

@Randy Holmes-Farley on the surface this thread seems pretty straight forward. However, I wonder what the end goal is. I highly doubt we'll see a company chime in defending their reasoning.

I'd imagine, it's more of a reflection for us, the consumers to take a hard look at why we allow companies to make such claims. And why we are gullible enough to believe them.

If so...

Then the question becomes, should we only purchase products that have undeniable proof? And, what does that undeniable proof look like? Do we put our trust in an organization that can provide such proof? Do we have it in us as a collective to designate an entity to make those decisions for us? What would the criteria be?

Here's some food for thought, Would we (as consumers) buy a product from a company that claimed, "we don't have solid evidence that our product does what it claims, but there's enough anecdotal evidence to say it makes a difference"?

Is there a level of honesty in that statement to make someone purchase it? Or is it still a marketing tactic?

My short term goal is to get reefers to want more explanation of claims. Maybe some will ask companies why they claim using the product makes their corals more purple, or whatever.

Long term goal is to get companies to either explain more or claim less.

For myself, I would not buy a product that I knew was misleading in claims, even if I also knew that I otherwise wanted to use it anyway. In fact, I black ball all products sold by that company.

I also try to help folks recognize when they are being bamboozled and may not know it. That involves alerting reefers to suspicious claims, and companies to clearly problematic claims.

An example of the latter was a long time Brightwell claim about their guaranteed analysis of their dry magnesium additive. They actually listed a % magnesium that was chemically impossible, and since they also said what was in the product, it was easy to prove it wrong. Emails with Jack Kent after he took over Brightwell fixed that issue in their claims. How many reefers believed it before it was taken down, and perhaps bought that product over others due to a false high value being "guaranteed" to them?

 

[SPS2020]

In a world where we ought to be smart enough to require evidence of something, does ANY manufacturer or supplier of reef aquarium additives actually provide evidence that the product does what it claims?

I don't mean simple ingredient claims such as contains (iron, vanadium, magnesium, etc) which is mostly meaningless without numbers (a pinch of dried ocean water meets that claim for any element), or even those with numbers (which themselves have even been wrong in some cases), but rather the more complex claims that really jazz up reefers, but for which no evidence is ever shown.

Here's a few real examples:

for intense coloration of coral
Stimulates and Optimizes Coral Growth
enhance the growth and coloration of corals
help with growth, coloration, and vitality
the end result is stronger, healthier and more colorful corals.
promotes the pink colors in corals
production of the purple/blue pigments in the soft tissue of corals.
may have a positive effect on the color of corals.
maintaining Bromide at appropriate levels is very beneficial for coral coloration and growth

The list goes on and on. It's like an arms race about supplements.

Here's what I imagine happens...

Company X claims purples are boosted by their concoction of elements.
Company Y thinks that if they don't make similar claims, who would buy it? What colors should we claim that no one else does? Hmmm. Soemthing they may have already and can look at and imagine it is getting better. Don't want a lot of returns...

This is pretty much any KZ product I have ever used. Shame on me and lesson learned...lots of snake oil in those bottles. This is my opinion and your mileage may vary!

 

[jda]

There are plenty of excellent hobbyists who for decades have told folks to mind the big 3, just change some water, and do not dose anything that you cannot personally test for. It is not so much the lack of advice, but the likely the lack of following that advice.

I just have a CaRx and change water. I do dose some iron since I grow a lot of chaeto. Going to switch to some smashed-up pills after my bottle of iron is done.

 

[blaxsun]

What was special about last year?

Vibrant and Tropic Marin come to mind. Beyond that just lots of QA issues from (supposedly) reputable manufacturers.

 

[Big E]

I used to ask these manufacturers for before/after pics on public forums and always got "crickets"

No one has ever given me data on depletion rates or shown any factual/scientific info on the need to dose some of the trace metals they claim are important.

I've done my own experimenting with various bacterial and carbon dosing products for at least 8 years and have never seen any better results than just using vinegar alone.

I do 10% water changes with IO, use a large skimmer and dose 2 part............my corals do best long term following this simple formula. Occasional activated carbon and GFO if needed.

 

[Dan_P]

I used to ask these manufacturers for before/after pics on public forums and always got "crickets"

No one has ever given me data on depletion rates or shown any factual/scientific info on the need to dose some of the trace metals they claim are important.

I've done my own experimenting with various bacterial and carbon dosing products for at least 8 years and have never seen any better results than just using vinegar alone.

I do 10% water changes with IO, use a large skimmer and dose 2 part............my corals do best long term following this simple formula. Occasional activated carbon and GFO if needed.

Except for bottled nitrifying bacteria, I always suspected bottled bacteria products were useless

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Just to be clear, I'm not suggesting all supplements or worthless. I just think the claims of what happens when you, for example, raise manganese from undetectable to a normal NSW level are unlikely to make green corals greener and red corals redder, or some such thing.

It may make them thrive better in some fashion.

What exactly that truly shows as is what should be claimed, or, in the absence of clear data to provide, maybe just make the statement that maintaining NSW levels is a prudent practice and this supplement helps you do it.

 

[taricha]

I've done my own experimenting with various bacterial and carbon dosing products for at least 8 years and have never seen any better results than just using vinegar alone.

I think this is a good general practice when thinking about bacteria products. Comparison to a known carbon dose.

 

[kenchilada]

Don’t pay attention to product labels, blogs, videos, forums, LFS employees, social media, government, CNN or MSNBC.

Find a friend with an amazing tank and do what they do. Unfortunately my wife doesn’t allow me to have friends.