Has anyone else used Petco Premium Salt before?

[darrowj]

I hesitate to post this but I'm curious so here it goes.

Yesterday I got a coupon for Petco for 10% off a purchase. Anyway, I needed salt for some water changes and decided to pick some up from my local store. For the past two years that I've had a tank I've always used Instant Ocean salt.

What I found at Petco yesterday was totally new to me. They now appear to have a new salt brand of thier our called Petco Premium Salt. (http://www.petco.com/product/101391/Aquatic-Gardens-Premium-Marine-Salt-Mix.aspx). I saw the bucket of salt was $10 less than the Instant Ocean brand (minus 8 pounds of salt I believe) and with my coupon I figured what the hell I would try it.

So I opened the packaging this morning and find 6 separate bags with salt in them. Fine, I think, this help break things up and I now have an extra bucket right away. Then I start removing these bags and notice that the salt is solid as a brick. It is so solid in fact that I literally needed to take a hammer to the salt to break it into manageable chucks.

Now I do my water change and see that the water is ever so slightly discolored. This is something I never noticed before with Instant Ocean. I almost didn't add the new water to the tank but needed to get to work and could not leave my tank in the state it was in. I'm at work now and am a little concerned. I plan on doing a water test when I get home and I'm a little concerned with what I will find. Thankfully my son is home from school this week and tells me that my fish and coral appear fine at the moment.

Has anyone else used Petco Premium Salt before?

 

[Snidgetless]

I definately would have run a full set of tests on the freshly mixed bucket before i added it to the tank.

 

[darrowj]

Agreed Snidgetless. I was in a hurry and living on the wild side I guess>

I regret not doing so now.

 

[addictedreefer]

I know it's cliche but its true... You get what you pay for...All salts are not created equal.
When it comes to our delicate ecosystems they deserve the very best we can afford. Personally I would not switch to a new salt mix(even a high end brand) without thoroughly testing the new water. Bad salts can be very harmful, potentially containing anything from low calcium and alk to high levels of phosphate, etc.
You may have dodged a bullet this time but you may want to be more cautious in the future.

 

[Richard]

Do you mean the water is cloudy?

I wouldn't use it I would return it.

 

[darrowj]

No the water was not cloudy. I let it sit while I made and ate some breakfast. I returned and I could see through the water clearly. I did notice an ever so slight brownish tinge to the water I thought. It was not overly noticeable but one of those things were you do a double take and say... "is that right... "

This is RO filtered water.

 

[Moe_K]

Thread moved out of the VE forum.

 

[stingythingy45]

THROW THAT SALT RIGHT IN THE TRASH!!!!
I first started out with that and snails/corals would not live in it!
You've been warned!!!
Do a search on Aquatic Gardens salt mix.......

 

[stingythingy45]

Oh.......and do a large water change with I.O. when you get home tonight!
Petco should be in court for selling that crap!!!
(made in China)......Probably has cyanide in it.

**BTW.....I wrote a review about how inverts would not live in that stuff.
Did you see it there.......no!

 

[Miller]

Sounds a little less then "premium", hopefully with only using it once you wont have to much trouble with it.

Instant Ocean and Oceanic are pretty cheap already, I start to wonder about something cheaper the IO.

Good luck with you tank!

 

[stingythingy45]

When I first got started I used that salt.
Read Fenner's book about how salt is salt.Well maybe back in 78' when there wasn't that many brands.This stuff is absolute poison.I almost quit until John down at Sea Creatures started going over what I used and my procedures with me.As soon as I switched to I.O. it made a world of difference.Snails started living and actually thriving.
ALL salt is not equal.I hope I can save some of the new folks some trouble like I went through.Something so simple...water/salt and the darn salt was poison.It was driving me crazy,came so close to just quiting.I thought it was just newbie stuff that I was doing.No............Petco almost drove another guy from the hobby.

*Sorry about being so passionate about this.