TRITON LABS - Core7 Base Elements - Canister 1

Our goal as reef keepers is to emulate natural seawater.Seawater is not mysterious, you can create it using a recipe of distilled water and chemical elements in controlled proportions.Let's say you have set up your aquarium with a salt mixture that approximates natural seawater.Is it going to stay like this?No!Fish, invertebrates, plants and bacteria constantly interact with seawater through respiration, excretion and natural nutrient cycling.These biochemical reactions consume elements and move their proportions away from those found in natural seawater.Elemental consumption is both natural and normal and must be considered when conserving reefs.

The other fundamental process that impacts the quality of your seawater is elemental contamination.Like it or not, unwanted elements will find their way into your aquarium.Metal corrosion from equipment, environmental toxins from paint, and even the food you feed your pets are all sources of contaminants that can build up and distort the balance of your natural seawater.

Each reef aquarium will consume elements and receive contaminants in unique ways.The only way to know what is really going on in your system is to test your seawater.THETestTRITON LABIs the most accurate, comprehensive and affordable seawater analysis available to reef keepers.When your water is tested, you will receive an email with a link to your online results where an easy-to-use “traffic light” reporting system alerts you to any issues.An online calculator automatically tells you which supplement or treatment to use and the exact dose required.

The beauty of the TRITON method is that you don't need to be a chemist to use it.Just test your sea water.Know what's in it.Take action to fix it.

A TRITON METHOD aquarium is a sophisticated, easy-to-use holistic solution for the modern reef keeper.The first step in reefing is to set up your new aquarium and allow the bacterial nitrogen cycle to establish.

To take full advantage of the TRITON METHOD, we recommend that your system uses a sump with a separate algae refuge (10-20% of the system volume) which in turn drains into the main sump where you perform filtration and apply reagent dosing.The return pump capacity should be approximately 10 times the system volume.

When you have established a stable, well-balanced system, send a sample of your seawater to TRITON LAB for analysis.This provides a baseline measurement of macro and trace elements in your seawater before any changes due to biological activity and/or external contamination.

By keeping track of the amount of basic elements you add to the system every day and performing regular ICP tests, you are effectively feeling the pulse of a beautiful, living coral reef system.Only the TRITON method gives you such conscious control.When you first set up your system, we recommend that you perform an ICP test every month.If everything appears balanced/stable and there are no obvious sources of contamination, you can extend the testing interval.Remember without testing you are flying blind.The cost and heartache of undetected contamination (replacement of lost livestock, seawater, time and labor) isalways superiorThe cost of periodic testing.

While Base Elements solutions provide the essential foundation of macro and trace elements, it is inevitable in small closed systems that there will be some drift from the natural seawater – either due to biological consumption or contamination.The purpose of the TRITON LAB routine test is to warn you BEFORE serious problems andpotentially costlyDo not occur.

As soon as your test is completed and verified by TRITON LAB, you will receive an email informing you that your results are available online.Simply log into your account and your results are presented in an easy-to-understand “traffic light” reporting system.Most problems are due to one or more elements being too low (supplement required) or too high (treatment required).The TRITON reporting system identifies these problems, flags them “red” and, using an online calculator, automatically tells you which supplement or treatment to use and the exact dose required.

Our support staff can be contacted for further information, as can the wider TRITON METHOD community.In fact, by using the TRITON METHOD, you are helping to maintain a better reef!Each test contributes to a statistical database that models the biochemical behavior of seawater, improving the advice we provide to our users.The TRITON method was created tothe guardsOfreefsByreef keepers.You don't need to be a chemist to use it and there is help available if you need it.

A closed system reef aquarium is like a room full of people with no windows - over time it becomes stuffy and unpleasant due to the build-up of gases that we don't like!In your saltwater system, you can see the signs of a "stuffy room" in the condition and behavior of your fish, invertebrates and plants.It's obvious that something is wrong but what to do?The traditional solution is to change the sea water which buys a little time but the stuffy room syndrome soon returns.The TRITON method is like a breath of fresh air because it allows you to detect and measure contamination before it becomes harmful.

Corrosion of metals from equipment, toxins from paint, and even the food you feed your pets can add contaminants that build up and distort your goal of maintaining “natural seawater.”Fortunately, ICP testing can detect when these elements are in unnatural proportions and the error correction report will recommend treatment to resolve the problem.However, it is important to understand that there can sometimes be side effects from the treatments applied to your reef aquarium.

For example, when chemical filtration with activated carbon is used to remove dissolved organic carbon (DOC), or to treat copper contamination, it will also clean some of the iodine from your system!Likewise, if your error correction report recommends an aluminum phosphate based stripper (DETOX), it will also bind arsenic, barium and some fluoride.So, following TRITON LAB tests is important to ensure that the balance of elements is maintained in your system.

The TRITON REAGENTS division offers a complete line of reagents to create, supplement and treat seawater.TRITON REAGENT customers benefit not only from our analytical expertise, but also from quality assurance driven by ICP, the same technology that powers our water testing services.TRITON REAGENTS are guaranteed to be free of impurities and are designed to support the TRITON METHOD, a fully science-based and easy-to-use workflow.