One of the absolute joys of reefkeeping, is the continuous search for amazing animals that you can add to your aquarium. It's quite simply addictive and exciting.
When adding new animals, there are some guidelines that are beneficial to follow. If you buy animals online, they are shipped in small bags of water and their transit can sometimes be a couple of days. Toxins build up in the water they are shipped in and we need to acclimate the animals to the new aquarium water as safely as we can.
With the Tropic Marin Compact Lab you get a whole range of test kits. But for acclimation of new animals purposes, we use the ammonia and pH tests. The ammonia test kit is to make sure the aquarium is cycled and not reading much ammonia. Adding animals to ammonia rich water spells disaster, so please do test it. Some of the first animals you might add are beneficial critters like snails and crabs. Snails are often packed tightly in small amounts of water and the water they come in can be very low in pH. So when you acclimate your snails, test the pH of the water they are in and the aquarium water. The goal with the acclimmation is to match the lower to the higher.
Adding a small cup of water to the transit bag every 15 minutes, is great practice and safe to do. When the pH matches to aquarium's, the water the animals are in should be almost completely aquarium water, and the animals are ready to add.
Some animals like echinoderms can be very sensitive and should be given careful acclimation. Please read up on the specific animals you buy, to make sure you take their special care in to consideration. -Samuel Christensen
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