Increasing salinty

[eww]

Well I screwed up tonight doing a water change. I started siphoning the water and my brain must have been on short circuit or something. I hadn't turned off the main pump, or the ATO. So as I am siphoning SW, FW is dumping in almost as fast into the sump. I didn't realize it until almost 5 gallons was siphoned out and I was seeing the shimmer of the fresh water in the DT. Ugh!!! I corrected the situation as immediately as possible but the results are the salinity has dropped from 1.026 to .1022. What is the best way to get this back in check? Do we need to be worried about the corals or fish? Should we plan on doing water changes daily for the next few days or is it something more/less urgent than that?

 

[pewpewlazerbeam]

Im obviously no expert on salt water, but i did something similar a few weeks ago. I siphoned out some water ( like a 10% wc) then added back the same amoutn with extra salt mixed in. I put it into my sump and let it slowly go into the tank. Everything was fine.

But ill shut up and let someone with actual experience chime in

 

[returnofsid]

You could do as pewpew suggested, or turn your ATO off and top off with SW, for a few days. Topping off with SW would work best, IF you evaporate a large enough amount daily, to raise the salinity in just a couple days or so.

 

[ac7av]

Quick lowering the salinity doesn’t seem to be to bad on things as long as it’s not a drop out the bottom like down to 1.015 or something like that. I’ve definitely noticed if I raise it to fast like .002 or more in one day, stuff starts going south real fast. I don’t know if it’s just me or what, but Id say raise it slow like mentioned above.

 

[NC2WA]

As Michael stated, the key is to raise salinity slowly over a couple of days..

 

[Slate]

I agree with Sid, just top off with saltwater. Heck that is even what Lee suggests for raising salinity after doing a hypo treatment, and he is a smart fella.

 

[returnofsid]

Just don't forget to turn your ato back on, once you've reached your desired salinity.

 

[eww]

Sounds simple enough. Thanks guys. I already have the ATO off an I'm mixing some more SW for top off over the next few days. Reef Frontiers rocks.