What’s worse???

Tautog · Apr 10, 2018

cmcoker said:
https://invasives.org.au/projects/pathogens/

http://harvardforest.fas.harvard.edu/major-research-topics/major-research-topics/invasive-plants-pests-and-pathogens

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4391917/

Well those articles are are interesting, but have nothing to do with saltwater systems or saltwater at all. Fact remains, if it wasn’t for salt in saltwater, none of us would be alive today. Though saltwater contains millions of different bacteria, saltwater also cleans itself. All reefers mix fish and corals from different oceans all the time. As a Environmental Chemist, I have the personal experiences, and I’ve seen the devastation. If you need to rave, point your finger elsewhere, there’s thousands of Super Sites, polluted areas polluted by man on land, right here in the US. These sites are easy to notice once you arrive, but our government refuses to act until it’s over-whelming, and effecting real estate value.........Money, it all comes down to money, and who gets blamed, and who needs to pay for clean-up.
If you ever lived near the sea, as a child, collecting stuff is a right of passage. On Sanibel Island, Fl., thousands of people from around the world travel there for one reason..........shell collecting! Go figure, but many people are on the beach at night with lights at low tide collecting. Collecting live fish and inverts is easy, but having the knowledge to know what goes together, lives together, reproduces, and can live in a closed system is experiencing it first hand. There’s more contamination with freshwater critters.........NO SALT. Because of that salt, most bacteria die off, dry up, and cause no contamination, whereas freshwater doesn’t as easy. Boaters in freshwater lakes are demanded to wash down and remove any lake water before leaving the ramp.

Tautog · Apr 10, 2018

Though freshwater critters, bacteria included, can’t live in saltwater, but saltwater stuff can easily handle freshwater environments. Many saltwater fish travel up stream into freshwater to reproduce.......Striped Bass, Salmon, Trout, Eels.........hence, brackish water, another whole environment...........for another conversation.......another day!

Tautog · Apr 10, 2018

Oh, I’ve had this fish for the past 1 1/2 yrs, and she isn’t slowly dying, but living very well. I use goldfish because they are a freshwater fish. Entering saltwater, any freshwater pest would die-off, and that’s exactly the reason I use them. But goldfish are hardy, and usually live about a 1/2 hour before the salt kills them or their eaten.
****** if anyone is interested, this local, native aquarium is the easiest, cheapest, by far, set up I’ve ever run. Adding native, local water can cause algae issues, but adding the right CUC is more important. Algae is used for filtration. I did add a container of Chaeto to float in the system. It grows fine under basic aquarium lights, nothing special. No sump, heater, skimmer, dosing, testing, and nothing compared to to running a reef tank.