Randy Holmes-Farley
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My Tank Thread
I sometimes get worried about how new Reef2Reef members might respond to the way we often post answers to questions, and I want to make sure folks understand where we are coming from. The discussion below is chemistry-based, but applies similarly well to many other parts of the hobby and Reef2Reef.
So please don't be offended if
1. We seem to immediately assume your problem is test error. We do not do this lightly, but in some cases we have seen this movie before, often dozens or hundreds of times before. A bad test result does not mean you are incompetent or even made any sort of apparent mistake. But test errors are super common, and are far more common than freakish chemistry results. High pH in the absence of high pH alkalinity additives is a good example. It is almost always test error. I could go on and on about different types of test errors, but will save you the pain. Don't assume we are impuning your abilities as a reefer.
2. We do not immediately answer your question, but follow up with an extensive discussion that may seem to imply that the person asking the question does not know what they are doing. That is not the intent, but a simple answer is not always appropriate. "I have a bad batch of salt, with 1240 ppm of magnesium. Should I return it?". Instead of answering yes or no, we may well delve into the magnesium measurement (the kit type, how you used it, how you read the syringe, etc.), the salinity value in that new salt water and how it was measured, how that new salt water was made (brand, tap water or no, mixing method, whether you mixed up a whole bucket or just a small fraction), etc. All of those things might be needed to answer that simple yes or no question.
3. We seem to largely disregard the answer you helpfully suggest to your own issue that you got from somewhere else (random reefer friend, lfs, another reef site, manufacturer web site, etc.). Again, we have seen some of these claims many times and some are not worth the time of day. Some may be debatable or are being taken out of the original context or were misunderstood, and some are simply wrong. Example: "what should I dose to increase purple colors in my corals?" A good answer might be "There is no such thing" or 'It is very complicated, let's discuss..." while an answer we might simply disregard is "the concoction sold by the lfs to boost purple colors by dosing 37 critical elements, lipids, carbohydrates, and vitamins".
4. We refuse to accept the mantra that the proof is in the pudding. This item comes up a lot, and many reefers misunderstand it. A single reef tank is proof that if every single thing in the way of husbandry done to it is repeated on a second, otherwise identical tank, then that second tank is likely to look similarly nice to the original. But that first tank is not in any way evidence that ANY SINGLE act of husbandry on the first tank is needed or useful, and may even be detrimental. You might accept it as evidence of import if I said the owner doses rubidium, but probably would not if I said the owner does a dance with a voodoo doll of her ex-husband every night when she doses calcium. Why accept one and not the other? Science starts with these sorts of anecdotes and tries to test them (e.g., stop the dance and the dosing of rubidium, and see if anything changes). Without testing, it's not evidence of anything except that it can be done in at least one tank, and still have a good tank.
5. We refuse to accept manufacturer assertions, and sometimes will not use them by themselves to provide answers (and especially not to prove a more careful analysis wrong). If a manufacturer claims a product contains 50,000 ppm calcium, we would not generally challenge it without some sort of testing or rationale for it being wrong. But more esoteric claims might be able to be immediately rejected by folks with an understanding of the claim. For example, a Poly-Filter turning red in the presence of aluminum when there is no known situation in the entire universe of chemistry where aluminum provides a red color. There are a surprisingly large number of claims that are wrong, or are presented in a way that leaves a reader interpreting them in an incorrect way (e.g., a product that correctly does 22 things in fresh water, only 5 of them in seawater, but simply says it "works" in both).
6. We may be harsh when pointing out problems in your assumptions. Be open and willing to accept new info, even if it is something you feel deep down is wrong. Fight for all you are worth if you believe you are right, but accept it when clear evidence suggests otherwise. This topic is hard for most of us. None of us like to be wrong, but things we learned from fresh water tanks we had in the past (nitrite toxicity) or from a trusted LFS that has "has never" led us wrong, or from some random web site that purports to have authoritative info when in reality it is just collected from other dubious sources, or even from a true expert that got something wrong, may not be correct after all. These all happen and we just need to move on, and accept that truth, whatever it is. Even if that truth is "we do not know". The way info spreads around the internet reminds me of something I read in a seismology textbook decades ago. It had to do with the difficulty of knowing what time an earthquake occurred back in the early 1800's. In some town in the western US, there was a big earthquake. The time of day was reported by multiple people, but was it right? Apparently, the army fort would fire a cannon every day at 5:00 pm, and many folks set their watches to it. But when the soldier in charge of the cannon was asked how he knew it was exactly 5, he said he set his watch by the clocks in the town jeweler. When the jeweler was asked, he said he set them all to 5 pm based on the cannon firing. I think that is a good analogy of how bad info spreads around the internet, perhaps getting modified a bit each time, getting worse and worse with each rewriting.
So please don't be offended if
1. We seem to immediately assume your problem is test error. We do not do this lightly, but in some cases we have seen this movie before, often dozens or hundreds of times before. A bad test result does not mean you are incompetent or even made any sort of apparent mistake. But test errors are super common, and are far more common than freakish chemistry results. High pH in the absence of high pH alkalinity additives is a good example. It is almost always test error. I could go on and on about different types of test errors, but will save you the pain. Don't assume we are impuning your abilities as a reefer.
2. We do not immediately answer your question, but follow up with an extensive discussion that may seem to imply that the person asking the question does not know what they are doing. That is not the intent, but a simple answer is not always appropriate. "I have a bad batch of salt, with 1240 ppm of magnesium. Should I return it?". Instead of answering yes or no, we may well delve into the magnesium measurement (the kit type, how you used it, how you read the syringe, etc.), the salinity value in that new salt water and how it was measured, how that new salt water was made (brand, tap water or no, mixing method, whether you mixed up a whole bucket or just a small fraction), etc. All of those things might be needed to answer that simple yes or no question.
3. We seem to largely disregard the answer you helpfully suggest to your own issue that you got from somewhere else (random reefer friend, lfs, another reef site, manufacturer web site, etc.). Again, we have seen some of these claims many times and some are not worth the time of day. Some may be debatable or are being taken out of the original context or were misunderstood, and some are simply wrong. Example: "what should I dose to increase purple colors in my corals?" A good answer might be "There is no such thing" or 'It is very complicated, let's discuss..." while an answer we might simply disregard is "the concoction sold by the lfs to boost purple colors by dosing 37 critical elements, lipids, carbohydrates, and vitamins".
4. We refuse to accept the mantra that the proof is in the pudding. This item comes up a lot, and many reefers misunderstand it. A single reef tank is proof that if every single thing in the way of husbandry done to it is repeated on a second, otherwise identical tank, then that second tank is likely to look similarly nice to the original. But that first tank is not in any way evidence that ANY SINGLE act of husbandry on the first tank is needed or useful, and may even be detrimental. You might accept it as evidence of import if I said the owner doses rubidium, but probably would not if I said the owner does a dance with a voodoo doll of her ex-husband every night when she doses calcium. Why accept one and not the other? Science starts with these sorts of anecdotes and tries to test them (e.g., stop the dance and the dosing of rubidium, and see if anything changes). Without testing, it's not evidence of anything except that it can be done in at least one tank, and still have a good tank.
5. We refuse to accept manufacturer assertions, and sometimes will not use them by themselves to provide answers (and especially not to prove a more careful analysis wrong). If a manufacturer claims a product contains 50,000 ppm calcium, we would not generally challenge it without some sort of testing or rationale for it being wrong. But more esoteric claims might be able to be immediately rejected by folks with an understanding of the claim. For example, a Poly-Filter turning red in the presence of aluminum when there is no known situation in the entire universe of chemistry where aluminum provides a red color. There are a surprisingly large number of claims that are wrong, or are presented in a way that leaves a reader interpreting them in an incorrect way (e.g., a product that correctly does 22 things in fresh water, only 5 of them in seawater, but simply says it "works" in both).
6. We may be harsh when pointing out problems in your assumptions. Be open and willing to accept new info, even if it is something you feel deep down is wrong. Fight for all you are worth if you believe you are right, but accept it when clear evidence suggests otherwise. This topic is hard for most of us. None of us like to be wrong, but things we learned from fresh water tanks we had in the past (nitrite toxicity) or from a trusted LFS that has "has never" led us wrong, or from some random web site that purports to have authoritative info when in reality it is just collected from other dubious sources, or even from a true expert that got something wrong, may not be correct after all. These all happen and we just need to move on, and accept that truth, whatever it is. Even if that truth is "we do not know". The way info spreads around the internet reminds me of something I read in a seismology textbook decades ago. It had to do with the difficulty of knowing what time an earthquake occurred back in the early 1800's. In some town in the western US, there was a big earthquake. The time of day was reported by multiple people, but was it right? Apparently, the army fort would fire a cannon every day at 5:00 pm, and many folks set their watches to it. But when the soldier in charge of the cannon was asked how he knew it was exactly 5, he said he set his watch by the clocks in the town jeweler. When the jeweler was asked, he said he set them all to 5 pm based on the cannon firing. I think that is a good analogy of how bad info spreads around the internet, perhaps getting modified a bit each time, getting worse and worse with each rewriting.
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