RTR wrote:Your first reference quotes me extensively and is not favorable overall to the use of salt routinely. On that WetmanNY and I agreed. This neither supports your contention nor explains how salt regulates osmotic balance in FW fish.
The second ref is not a FW example. Such fish are not by anyone's definition FW.
The last ref does not support your position either, but is to my reading closer to my own position than yours.
Although the Skeptical Aquarist is an excellent site and the author did a lot of research for it, even as a review article it is not peer-reviewed and a valid ref. Neither is PFM, whatever its value. Only the second article is valid in that sense, and it does not apply to this discussion as it does deakl with a FW fish.
Osmoregulation applies to FW and SW. Saltier on the inside, FW, saltier on the outside SW. The process to maintain the balance...osmoregulation. SW or FW as an example is irrelevant! Surely you must know this. I provided valid references, if you fail to understand it thats not my problem. It supports it. End of story. If your obtuse about the subject it is a problem happily out of my control. Adding salts to the water makes it easier for fish to replenish them when lost.
With this I'm done. I won't debate someone who is incapable of doesn't want to be open minded.
Community fish are always welcome. Mine do need to eat.
Sodium chloride, or sodium ions and chloride ions do not, repeat do not, regulate osmotic balance or osmolarity. They are among the many ions so regulated, and nothing in the references you cited supports your concept that they regulate osmolarity or that supplements of those ions are beneficial to FW fish on a chronic basis regardless of other water parameters. That is simply not the case, it is only another long-standing aquarium myth that will not die.
RTR wrote:Sodium chloride, or sodium ions and chloride ions do not, repeat do not, regulate osmotic balance or osmolarity. They are among the many ions so regulated, and nothing in the references you cited supports your concept that they regulate osmolarity or that supplements of those ions are beneficial to FW fish on a chronic basis regardless of other water parameters. That is simply not the case, it is only another long-standing aquarium myth that will not die.
Wheres your facts? I do not take your work for it.
Did you read the same links I did? You really must be obtuse.
Community fish are always welcome. Mine do need to eat.
Daddyo, I don't think RTR is arguing that osmoregulation is not important. Instead, he is arguing that aquarium salt (sodium chloride) is only a small - and by itself possibly insignificant - part of the salts that the fish need to regulate.
My Puffers: Puffers I have kept: T lineatus T miurus A modestus T biocellatus C valentini C coranata C papuan C lorteti DPs suvattii burrfish T niphobles
Please keep this discussion friendly. Calling folks names, like "bud" (which I removed) & obtuse, will not get you anywhere. This is not a battle of wits.
You are getting sleepy... you only hear the sound of my voice... you must do water changes... water changes... water changes... water changes...
I agree, please keep this friendly. So far things are ok, but usually these kind of discussions end up heating up rather quickly...
Personally, I don't use aquarium salt, except for Ich outbreaks (hasn't ever happend to me though) or hatching brine shrimp. I feel that since FW fish don't encounter aquarium salt in the wild, there would be no need for it in an aquarium, except for aformentioned Ich outbreak.
The only problems i've had with disease over the last 1 1/2 years is a Tape worm in my Modestus. Which wasn't even caused by me, he probably had it his whole life, and I only got him 7 months ago. Although recently I have resolved that the majority of my Modestus' rapid breathing through his mouth, and awkward "chewing" of food is due to old age rather then a disease. At least, thats what I have concluded.
I'm not disagreeing with anybody. If you have done well with aquarium salt, then cool. Go with it. I'm just stating my personal opinion
Sodium chlorige is useful as a med in certain cases, that is not any part of this issue.
The issue is only the recommendation to add such routinely and chronically to all FW fish tanks to "regulate osmosis". Sodium ions and chloride ions do not regulate osmosis. They are among the many ions which are regulated to maintain the fish's appropriate osmolarity, but each ion is controlled individually and severally. Some ion pumps are ion exchanges, so are linked in that manner, but those pairs are used for a low-energy exchange where one of the pair is most commonly in excess and the other must be scavenged. Even in that specific case, it is not a control or regulation of one ion by the other, only the lowest energy cost to fish to trade like-charge ions rather than actively pumping one out while actively bringing the other in via another ion pump process. The other format is there as well, the exchange pumps are the low-cost process used when the ion in excess is available for trading for the needed ion, killing two birds with one stone in effect.
The issues and the fallacy lies in the concept that since osmotic balance is a non-trivial enargy cost to the fish (this is correct, it is a very real energy cost), then adding salt to the water, increasing the TDS/osmotic pressure of the water will reduce the energy costs to the fish. It sounds good, but it does not work that way. The logical end point of that would be to increase the TDS/osmotic pressure of the tank water until it matched the fish's internal osmolarity. This would mean keeping all FW fish in effectively light brackish water. Do I really need to explain how and why that is a non-starter? By the same token, all marine fish would be moved down to light brackish as well, and then they could all be kept together. Historically it has been tried, even with commercial products available for doing the osmotic adjustment. Do I need to elaborate on how effective that technique was in keeping fish?
Most FW and BW fish are extremely adaptable to variations in TDS/osmotic pressure because they are adapted over geologic time selecting exactly those fish which could adapt to seasonal or tidal changes. Reef fish may be far less adaptable (variable with the species) as they have not had the same selection pressures. But for them all, their adaptability is within a certain range, reflecting largely the total range of their native environment, with a bit of margin at the extremes.
The alternate view favored by those who add NaCL routinely is that that supplement is lower energy cost and the fish is therfore healthier and longer-lived - which has never been shown in any reproduceable manner by anyone. The bit extra supposedly in favor of salt use is for disease protection. Well, I think most folks on this forum are already aware of the fallacies there. That stemed from the related myth that Ich was always present in tanks, and was disproven decades ago.
Misunderstanding and even mythology we will always have with us. But that does mean that we must or should stand by when anyone proposes an ineffecive technique as being beneficial. That is not what we are here to do. If we collectively do not stand up for what we know to be best available practice at this time, then we need not be here. This is neither a philosophy class nor a science class, it is just helping folks to understand and apply what is needed to do the best job available to keep fish alive and healthy for the longest time.
