Tropic marin pro reef salt...German made buckets though...

[Unitylover]

 

[ReefRondo]

Couple of photos of my most recent corals with STN. Not great photos I'm afraid taken with my iPhone and a clip-on filter. Top one is sarmentosa and bottom one is valida. These seem to be the next two to be affected.

 

[ReefRondo]

Ok so the results are in…this is just RO water and TMPR salt mixed to 1.025 salinity. RO unit is the Aquamedic platinum line plus and all 4 filters were changed 20 days ago. I also live in Scotland and have a very clean water supply in general.

Triton Lab Showroom - Explore this water test results and click on the image above.

Someone wants to show you the water test results and shared this link to the evaluation. Click on the image above to explore the water test results.

www.triton-lab.de

 

[areefer01]

Ok so the results are in…this is just RO water and TMPR salt mixed to 1.025 salinity. RO unit is the Aquamedic platinum line plus and all 4 filters were changed 20 days ago. I also live in Scotland and have a very clean water supply in general.

Triton Lab Showroom - Explore this water test results and click on the image above.

Someone wants to show you the water test results and shared this link to the evaluation. Click on the image above to explore the water test results.

www.triton-lab.de

And your thought or summary is?

 

[ReefRondo]

And your thought or summary is?

Looks like my TMPR salt has excessive Manganese and Sulphur.

 

[LeftyReefer]

Looks like my TMPR salt has excessive magnesium and Sulphur.

That's not what it says.

your magnesium is completely fine.
Sulphur is only marginally high.

its manganese that is high in that sample, not magnesium. Manganese is a trace element, hardly anything to worry about.
Many reefers dose it to feed goni's and other flowerpots. I believe manganese is in Goni-Power and the like.

I don't think those results look bad.

 

[ReefRondo]

That's not what it says.

your magnesium is completely fine.
Sulphur is only marginally high.

its manganese that is high in that sample, not magnesium. Manganese is a trace element, hardly anything to worry about.
Many reefers dose it to feed goni's and other flowerpots. I believe manganese is in Goni-Power and the like.

I don't think those results look bad.

Sorry, my phone changed the word to Magnesium.

 

[areefer01]

That's not what it says.

your magnesium is completely fine.
Sulphur is only marginally high.

its manganese that is high in that sample, not magnesium. Manganese is a trace element, hardly anything to worry about.
Many reefers dose it to feed goni's and other flowerpots. I believe manganese is in Goni-Power and the like.

I don't think those results look bad.

More or less what I saw as well which is why I had asked.

 

[Lou Ekus]

Sorry, my phone changed the word to Magnesium.

@ReefRondo I just want to offer my time and services to try to help you diagnose what is going on in your system. I understand that ANY post I make these days seems to be an open invitation to controversy. This is not meant to do that, or meant as a defensive move. I just don't like to see people having system issues. Your recent ICP results seem very normal. There must be some other influencing factors. If you are up for a more private conversation, in more detail, taking more time, my email address is [email protected]. I am also happy and available to chat by phone if you would like that better. Just email me your number and a good time to call you. Keep in mind the USA / Scotland difference. We could also ZOOM call if that would be better.

 

[A_Blind_Reefer]

@ReefRondo I just want to offer my time and services to try to help you diagnose what is going on in your system. I understand that ANY post I make these days seems to be an open invitation to controversy. This is not meant to do that, or meant as a defensive move. I just don't like to see people having system issues. Your recent ICP results seem very normal. There must be some other influencing factors. If you are up for a more private conversation, in more detail, taking more time, my email address is [email protected]. I am also happy and available to chat by phone if you would like that better. Just email me your number and a good time to call you. Keep in mind the USA / Scotland difference. We could also ZOOM call if that would be better.

This shows some of the best customer service available! Kudos to you Lou!

 

[ReefRondo]

@ReefRondo I just want to offer my time and services to try to help you diagnose what is going on in your system. I understand that ANY post I make these days seems to be an open invitation to controversy. This is not meant to do that, or meant as a defensive move. I just don't like to see people having system issues. Your recent ICP results seem very normal. There must be some other influencing factors. If you are up for a more private conversation, in more detail, taking more time, my email address is [email protected]. I am also happy and available to chat by phone if you would like that better. Just email me your number and a good time to call you. Keep in mind the USA / Scotland difference. We could also ZOOM call if that would be better.

Lou, that is an amazing offer which I will gladly take you up on. Very kind of you. I mean no harm to Tropic Marin at all but after countless tests and digging I got down to salt or my water supply. I was not one to jump on the Turkey situation as my salt was all from Germany. It obviously concerned me though and has led to a slight balance issue in my faith in the brand. This is in no way your fault at all and although I have not read all of the threads and do not intend to either I feel you have been trying so so hard to fix this unfortunate situation. I am not angry about this situation at all but do want to try and find the culprit and stop it from continuing as it is really upsetting seeing these amazing animals perish like this when I am trying so hard to make them thrive. Thanks again for your post I personally really appreciate it although I understand others may not.

 

[drawman]

Ok let me see if I can do this eloquently and not work myself into a tizzy. This is kind of a hot button for me.

Most every content maker I follow, as well as the public figures associated with TM have made public-facing statements regarding the suspect salt from Turkey. I probably haven't heard every last podcaster and YouTuber in the world's take, but I've heard the positions taken by Lou Ekus (Tropic Marin), BRS, The Reefing Report, Mr Saltwater Tank via SaltwaterAquarium.com, and a few more YouTubers. The general position I perceive is that the hobbyists who have lost corals are full of it.

I get that their responses are much more nuanced than this, and that I may be oversimplifying their statements. But here are some things I've heard over and over:

"we have no evidence that the salt is causing any harm to corals"

"People always blame their salt when stuff dies"

"When you see something die, it's caused by something you did 2 weeks ago, not the water change you did this morning"

"If the salt really had something bad in it, everybody's corals would have died, not just some people's"

"Water changes can't kill your corals"

These are exactly the types of things you say when you're compelled to give your take in very general terms on your podcast or YouTube channel; based on a very basic glimpse at the "news story". But when you walk into the forest and see the trees, it all changes.

There was a weekend when my wife was out of town a few months ago and I went to the coffee shop and thought I'd catch up on R2R on a lazy Saturday morning. I bumped into the big Turkey Tropic Marin salt thread and read every single post from every single hobbyist there. This was the first I had heard of the situation and I had no preconceived notions or opinions.

What I found were extremely detailed reports from very seemingly intelligent reefers who, to the best of my ability in understanding their experiences, had corals straight up die due to them doing a water change.

That thread led to me the next Turkey salt thread, and the next Turkey salt thread. 4 and a half hours later, I think I read every single claim from everyone that reported problems on R2R, as well as a few FB reports and a few on other forums.

Mixed into these experiences were also a lot of me-too'ers who claimed them or their uncle also had everything die, and they recently did a water change. These people provide no detail, timeline, or credibility. And these are the same people who seem to be fueling the argument of those that say that people are full of it. These tag-alongs ultimately diminish the credibility of those that had genuine losses likely due to the salt.

Those that put the proper effort into explaining their experiences had changed absolutely nothing for months before their issues. They open a brand new bucket of salt and conduct a water change; then within hours or minutes, started seeing immediate negative signals in their corals, and then straight up death.

Now couple this with the observations upon opening the new container of salt:

• A strong chemical-like citrus odor similar to a cleaning or disinfecting product.
• Clarity, cloudiness and color issues when mixing the new salt
• Brown residue on the mixing vessel after mixing one batch of salt
• Odd flakes, shavings, caked elements, shards, and random objects from case to case

Now going back to all the podcasters, YouTubers, BRS and general content creators, their statements were so generalized that I was 100% confident that these people did NOT spend 4 and a half hours reading through every report in detail. In fact, I get the feeling that these people didn't read a single report. I believe they formed a general opinion based on the collective "history" of complainers – with the lowest common denominator in mind.

The exception to this would be Lou Ekus, who I know dealt with lots of people one on one.

All those content creators went on to praise Tropic Marin for "doing the right thing" and acknowledging the issue. But in my eyes, and everything I saw in response, they threw everyone reporting losses under the bus. They claimed that there is no evidence at all that the salt caused any losses.

BS

The fact that there could be other reasons for corals dying provided the exact ambiguity they needed to claim their own ambiguity in anyone's ability to provide "proof". But what I realized through the entire process is that there was actually no way to even possibly provide proof! It's the perfect out for TM. While so many praise TM for acknowledgement of some minor issue with clay or whatever they concluded, they pooped on the experiences of those who lost a lot of livestock.

And to provide just a little more important detail on the easy out...
Whatever the source of the issue with the Turkey salt was – it caused issues with sensitive corals, usually SPS. I point this out because it generally had no effect at all on less sensitive corals like softies and most LPS.

There were also inconsistencies from bucket to bucket. Some people would have issues with one bucket but not the next, which came from the exact same batch. This diminished the credibility of those making claims, and created challenges to get an admission of there actually being a problem. This was coupled by TM using the fact that a lot of affected reefers did not go out of their way to package and ship samples to Lou Ekus, or the fact that they threw away the bad salt, as if it's their responsibility to provide these things. These inconsistencies do not mean that the particular buckets that appeared to have problems were not anything but absolutely real problems.

So these inconsistencies in corals dying for some people and not others (remember, it mostly affected sensitive corals, and not everyone keeps the same corals), coupled with some buckets seeming to be OK, created a lot of ambiguity and a reason to deny the real severity of the issue.

Using a little common sense, it feels pretty easy to deduce that A) the Turkey salt just wasn't right and B) it seems to have killed corals.

For those wondering (the 2 people still reading this post) I'm not one of those people that had corals die, or any bad experience with this salt. I'm a Tropic Marin customer. I have no issue with Tropic Marin or Lou Ekus. I actually really love TM and actually just praised them in another thread today. I'm just really empathetic for those that lost LOTS of corals, and whose experiences are being rejected, made to be the butt of a joke, implied as stupid, etc.

Very well said. I think an additional problem is that there is this perception that any contaminant will be picked up on ICP which is far from the case. It is certainly a useful tool but no magic bullet.