How is this even possible? Salinity at 1.034

[Sharkbait19]

I got back from vacation, and some of my corals were looking upset in my 40 Breeder. I tested the water and found the salinity to be at 1.034!! What’s strange is that only three of my corals look upset, the rest is fine, including my fish and inverts. How is that even possible? At first I double checked my instruments and used both my hydrometer and refractometer, and it is indeed at 1.034. This must have been a slow climb considering everything is still alive. How should I go about bringing it back down without killing everything? Would a gallon replacement per day for the next few days be best?
Thanks!

 

[Reef Wizard]

I got back from vacation, and some of my corals were looking upset in my 40 Breeder. I tested the water and found the salinity to be at 1.034!! What’s strange is that only three of my corals look upset, the rest is fine, including my fish and inverts. How is that even possible? At first I double checked my instruments and used both my hydrometer and refractometer, and it is indeed at 1.034. This must have been a slow climb considering everything is still alive. How should I go about bringing it back down without killing everything? Would a gallon replacement per day for the next few days be best?
Thanks!

Not sure the effect corals will have probably be a relief for them but Fish can take a drop. You might be able to do up to 5 gallons over next 48-72 hours. 5 gallons a day that is maybe faster

 

[RedReefer]

Evaporation with no fresh top off?

 

[fishyjoes]

Either you had evap with no top off, top off with salt water, or you were dosing something.

 

[Sharkbait19]

I’ve been dosing reef carbon to maintain high alk, and evaporation hardly occurs in my tank due to there being a tight glass hood. Perhaps I messed up my last water change when mixing saltwater, or the lid wasn’t placed tightly while I was away, causing significant evaporation. I’m just shocked that not even my star or urchin died… I guess these things are much tougher than I give them credit for!

 

[Reef Wizard]

I’ve been dosing reef carbon to maintain high alk, and evaporation hardly occurs in my tank due to there being a tight glass hood. Perhaps I messed up my last water change when mixing saltwater, or the lid wasn’t placed tightly while I was away, causing significant evaporation. I’m just shocked that not even my star or urchin died…

Just pondering the reason this could have happened. Evaporation seems unlikely it would go that high but with a sudden increase Id expect more damage. I guess count your blessings and double check your top off and any premade salt water

 

[fish farmer]

I’ve been dosing reef carbon to maintain high alk, and evaporation hardly occurs in my tank due to there being a tight glass hood. Perhaps I messed up my last water change when mixing saltwater, or the lid wasn’t placed tightly while I was away, causing significant evaporation. I’m just shocked that not even my star or urchin died… I guess these things are much tougher than I give them credit for!

When was the last time you calibrated your refractometer?

 

[DanyL]

In general, coral can thrive in high salinity just as much as in lower salinity levels.
Take the Red Sea for example, it has around 40 ppt and supports a wide variety corals.

I do believe the raise in salinity was gradual rather than sudden, because otherwise, like any other sudden change in water chemistry, the corals would’ve noticed and showed stress signs right away.
That being said, some corals are far more resilient than others, so I’m not taking the option of a sudden raise off the table either.

As for the reasons why?
1. If it was indeed evaporation than you’d physically see missing water.
2. You may have mistakenly filled your ATO reservoir with saltwater.
3. You have left more water in the system during the last WC, it evaporated till the point your ATO float valve/sensor was and left the salts behind. This would look like there was no evaporation, when there really was.
4. The least likely option imo - you have mistakenly mixed the wrong concentration of water - but for a high salinity WC to make a significant change, it would need to be quite concentrated because you only change a portion of the water.

 

[Sharkbait19]

When was the last time you calibrated your refractometer?

I did so today before testing

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I did so today before testing

How?

The most obvious explanation is test error.

 

[RSNJReef]

I’ve had my lps tank go to 1.032 salinity before, but it got there over months. I suffered no losses and corals and fish were fine. The fish and coral would get used to it within a limit if done slowly, but definitely agree that a tank should not stay at that level because your fishes kidneys are in overdrive at that point and your coral I wouldn’t think could take it long term.

 

[Reef Wizard]

I got back from vacation, and some of my corals were looking upset in my 40 Breeder. I tested the water and found the salinity to be at 1.034!! What’s strange is that only three of my corals look upset, the rest is fine, including my fish and inverts. How is that even possible? At first I double checked my instruments and used both my hydrometer and refractometer, and it is indeed at 1.034. This must have been a slow climb considering everything is still alive. How should I go about bringing it back down without killing everything? Would a gallon replacement per day for the next few days be best?
Thanks!

Just had my main display go up to 1.030 in a weeks time as I test every week. I hadnt even done a water change only thing I did was add to the Top off reservoir. I double checked my Refractometer with 35ppt solution and it was spot on. I also checked my fresh water and it was fine no accidental dumping of saltwater in it.

Did you ever find out what was cause to yours? also do you by chance have Marine pure media in your tank?

2" Cubes

Designed for Ammonia and Nitrite removal but we've found that they also make an excellent habitat for Copepods. One MarinePure Sphere has the same surface area as 1,350 plastic 1.5" bio-balls. See below for detailed information.

www.algaebarn.com

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

Just had my main display go up to 1.030 in a weeks time as I test every week. I hadnt even done a water change only thing I did was add to the Top off reservoir. I double checked my Refractometer with 35ppt solution and it was spot on. I also checked my fresh water and it was fine no accidental dumping of saltwater in it.

Did you ever find out what was cause to yours? also do you by chance have Marine pure media in your tank?

2" Cubes

Designed for Ammonia and Nitrite removal but we've found that they also make an excellent habitat for Copepods. One MarinePure Sphere has the same surface area as 1,350 plastic 1.5" bio-balls. See below for detailed information.

www.algaebarn.com

FWIW, There is no hobby media that will noticeably increase the salinity of seawater. It takes a lot of added salts.

Possibilities include test error, not enough evaporation replacement, evaporation replacement with salt water, or large additions of things that add salts, such as using a two part alk/calcium system.

 

[Dom]

I got back from vacation, and some of my corals were looking upset in my 40 Breeder. I tested the water and found the salinity to be at 1.034!! What’s strange is that only three of my corals look upset, the rest is fine, including my fish and inverts. How is that even possible? At first I double checked my instruments and used both my hydrometer and refractometer, and it is indeed at 1.034. This must have been a slow climb considering everything is still alive. How should I go about bringing it back down without killing everything? Would a gallon replacement per day for the next few days be best?
Thanks!

Is it possible you've been using prepared salt water instead of RODI for top off?

 

[Reef Wizard]

FWIW, There is no hobby media that will noticeably increase the salinity of seawater. It takes a lot of added salts.

Possibilities include test error, not enough evaporation replacement, evaporation replacement with salt water, or large additions of things that add salts, such as using a two part alk/calcium system.

The reason I was asking about the media these appear to be disintegrating slowly over time and its got me wanting to replace them.

I added some Aquaforest kh buffer powder 2 weeks ago. But it was only enough to raise dkh from about 8.8 to 9.2. I split into two doses across 48 hours to be extra safe.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

The reason I was asking about the media these appear to be disintegrating slowly over time and its got me wanting to replace them.

I added some Aquaforest kh buffer powder 2 weeks ago. But it was only enough to raise dkh from about 8.8 to 9.2. I split into two doses across 48 hours to be extra safe.

Yes, they can disintegrate, but won’t dissolve any large amount of ions. I personally would not use such media in any case.

Given your description, the buffer was not the cause. Test error seems most likely. Even if the refractometer is accurate now, perhaps it wasn’t in the past.

 

[Sharkbait19]

Just had my main display go up to 1.030 in a weeks time as I test every week. I hadnt even done a water change only thing I did was add to the Top off reservoir. I double checked my Refractometer with 35ppt solution and it was spot on. I also checked my fresh water and it was fine no accidental dumping of saltwater in it.

Did you ever find out what was cause to yours? also do you by chance have Marine pure media in your tank?

2" Cubes

Designed for Ammonia and Nitrite removal but we've found that they also make an excellent habitat for Copepods. One MarinePure Sphere has the same surface area as 1,350 plastic 1.5" bio-balls. See below for detailed information.

www.algaebarn.com

I don’t have that in my tank. I never figured out why, but I did manage to bring the salinity back down.
I’m confident it wasn’t a testing error, because everything ran normally on fresh water as well as my other reef tank.

Is it possible you've been using prepared salt water instead of RODI for top off?

It’s possible, but I usually don’t have a lot of evaporation (glass hood).

 

[Garf]

Just had my main display go up to 1.030 in a weeks time as I test every week. I hadnt even done a water change only thing I did was add to the Top off reservoir. I double checked my Refractometer with 35ppt solution and it was spot on. I also checked my fresh water and it was fine no accidental dumping of saltwater in it.

Did you ever find out what was cause to yours? also do you by chance have Marine pure media in your tank?

2" Cubes

Designed for Ammonia and Nitrite removal but we've found that they also make an excellent habitat for Copepods. One MarinePure Sphere has the same surface area as 1,350 plastic 1.5" bio-balls. See below for detailed information.

www.algaebarn.com

What sort of wizardry is this? If you can manufacture salt from thin air, you are going to be a very rich alchemist, lol. If your test method has been consistent and accurate perhaps you've lost 15% of water volume through evaporation, or added 15% of volume of rocks, or added 15% of saltwater somehow.

 

[PopBot16]

How are you calibrating your refrac? And the refrac and hydrometer both say 34?

 

[Doctorgori]

Is it possible you've been using prepared salt water instead of RODI for top off?

IWierd was going to post the same thing….I did this before: mixed up my make up water with the RO jug … tank was at 40ppt for a long while with no noticeable downside …
So unfortunately can’t offer what the limits of salt tolerances are before negative impact