Anyone use Marc Weiss Products?

[Bonedaddy]

Specifically Live Sand Booster, Bacter Vital, Reef Vital DNA?

[tdwyatt]

woooooo hooooooo!!!! Bad topic...

[tdwyatt]

Sorry, I got off topic... No, I don't use ANY of Marc's products, mainly because I feel that they use marketing to promote their product to inexperienced reefers to get them to use unnecessary and expensive products that could easily be replaced by regular 10% water changes. The only additives most of us need to consider are possible alkalinity builders and (definitely) Calcium replacements, food, top off water, and light. Many of the swings that reefs see when they are new are due to the natural competition of the tank's inhabitants as they strive to get limited resources for their own growth at the expense of other organisms, especially slime algae, etc...(much the same way that some reef additive companies do... The most successful tanks are those that use natural food chains to establish a balance based on competition for those resources, rather than trying to replace them. Replacement of many of the limited resource items ends up making large pendulum swings, rather than smaller and smaller swings in nuisance blooms, etc. I would venture to say that not only are the water change replacements of trace elements and minerals more effective in the long run than using supplements, but that water changes are more economical as well.

[reefcam]

I have...eeekk, I actually admit to it. Oh well.

Not sure what the benefits are. My corals didn't explode. Oh wait, I lost my elegance short after a month of usage. Coincidence??? Not sure. But I did notice an explosion in the number of codepods and britsle worms. So may the critters are eating it.

Just too expensive to keep using. Back to Tahitan Blend.

[FishDaddy]

Bonedaddy,
I personally don't use any additives in my tanks except food (sometimes with Selcon), water changes and dripping Kalkwasser. I have long considered trying some DT's Phytoplankton and may, but that would be about it.
I am not convinced that any other supplements are necessary given a properly maintained tank. There has been volumes written in articles; the boards and of course, advertising, but I think proper feeding and good husbandry are the nutritional keys to a successful reef.
Here is a 2 part article by Dr. Shimek that is worth reading: http://www.aquarium.net/0197/0197_4.shtml http://www.aquarium.net/0297/0297_6.shtml
One quote from the article:
"Aquarists have built up quite a
mythology around additives to marine reef tanks, but in most cases there is no scientific rationale for adding most of these
additives."
HTH
Dick

[Doug1]

The sales success on so many products like these is founded on everyones desire to have a killer reef. Unfortunatly even if you start with cured LR and decent sand ant time you move the stuff it sets up major changes in a system that need time to settle down. My own 75 is a little over 3 months old, moved from a smaller tank and is still going through a recycling, maturity period Believe me if there were products on the market that perform the miracles claimed by some of these manufacturers you would be hearing all about it on the big reef boards. You don't cause there isn't a magic elixer that will take the place of Light, proper food, calcium and buffering supplements and water changes over a long period of time. Patience and water changes gets most people farther than all the fancy stuff, look at most successful nano tanks, low tech, usually skimmerless, just frequen water changes over long spans of time

[Alice]

The owner of the shop where I work part time likes to use them, I don't think they're necessary and never recommend them. I don't use them and have yet to have a green algae bloom in my tank, which seems to be a common occurrence with these type of "miracle additives."

Ron Shimek did mention that if no other form of food was available to corals that the use of Coral Vital was *acceptable* and that it had more nutrition than he had suspected, about the same as frozen brine shrimp, but that's not saying much and it's darn expensive.

~Alice