Rain water?

[fitbmxdude989]

here recently i was at my lfs and was talking to my good friend who owns it, he told me that he had recently been using rain water in his aquariums, this sounds new to me, whats the census?

 

[shrimpy brains]

You'd have to find a way to colect it without it going thru gutters, pipes etc. This would make it hard to colect a significant amount. If you have a small tank, might get enough.
I'd start by collecting some and testing it, before you decide for sure!
There are a couple of threads on this. You might want to do a search and see what they came up with for an answer. I don't remember.

 

[curry]

You'd have to collect it where theres no air pollution... From what I hear as the rain falls its collecting the pollutants in the air.

 

[shwstpr88]

acid rain sounds great for our tanks.

 

[cranberry]

I have to wash my car after it rains here......

 

[jstdv8]

yeah, maybe if you lived waaay out in the sticks I might try that, but nowhere near a big city

 

[meowzer]

Here's a thread that was done a few months ago....maybe it will help you decide
https://forums.saltwaterfish.com/vb/s...ght=rain+water

 

[fitbmxdude989]

thanks for the hyperlinks, the reason i asked is because of the acid rain it just sounded odd to me

 

[tank a holic]

as the rain falls it picks up pollutants like previously stated, you'd have to let it rain an hour or so to clear the pollutants then start collecting clean water

 

[fitbmxdude989]

thanks, i live way up in the moutains in pa now, so the water we get is pure spring water, i was just thinking of alternate methods

 

[rlablan]

I could be wrong on this...
But I was thinking that rain water is generally high in nitrates. It is this way because of where it is absorbed from and where it touches/mixes before it falls.
Nitrates are good for plants/flowers/crops. I say this because that is a major ingredient in miracle grow and alot of other plant foods.
That is why indoor house plants respond so well to rain water after a long time of only getting tap water.
I am not sure that i would want that in my tank just because of that. A low nitrate system is what people strive for... so... ?