Natural sea water required testing?

[aquatic26]

I know there are a lot of posts on using natural sea water, but I haven't found an answer to this question yet. What specific tests (other than checking salinity) do I need to do on natural sea water to determine if it is safe for my tank? I live a block from two of the top 5 cleanest bays in the U.S. and would love to do the initial fill of my tank with NSW instead of preparing 15 gallons of water at one time. TIA!

 

[sc50964]

Do you have a reef or fish only?

 

[aquatic26]

Do you have a reef or fish only?

I will start with fish, but adding reef eventually

 

[Timfish]

I would start with all the regular tests done with any reef system. Since there's a lot we can't test for if tests show good parameters I'd run the water through a carbon filter either before or as you fill yuor system.

 

[sc50964]

I will start with fish, but adding reef eventually

Fish only - ph, dKh, ammonia

That’s about it.

Reef - bring out the whole reef testing kit

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

If you believe it’s clean, and you are not near a river entrance, I’d just test salinity. In seawater, major and minor ions track with salinity.

If you think it may be polluted, you need icp to check metals.

 

[Nano_Man]

I use nsw and I tested at the beginning ammonia nitrate phosphate and ph Alk all bang on small trace of nitrate. I use it in my native cold water and my tropical marine BTA tank . The only thing I check every time is salinity . Due to rain fall or no rain changing salinity . But every thing is thriving in both tanks . I Don’t use skimmers just weekly small water change

 

[Rjramos]

Been using NSW for 30+ years in south Florida. Always collect offshore on my boat, or ocean inlet on incoming to high tide. Tested many times, not much fluctuation. Basically pH is 8.3-8.4, salinity 1.026, KH always around 7, cal around 415, mag 1300, PO4 and NO3 have always been 0 or undetectable.