API Aquarium Salt

API Aquarium Salt is evaporated sea salt sold for freshwater tanks, used mainly as a short-term tonic during illness or stress rather than as a permanent addition.

Key features

• Plain sodium chloride with no additives, dyes or anti-caking agents.
• Commonly used in hospital and quarantine tanks to support fish recovering from stress or minor infections.
• Also used by keepers of species that do genuinely prefer harder water with a little salt in it.

Where salt is and is not appropriate

• This is not a general tonic for every freshwater aquarium. Many soft-water species, including most tetras, rasboras, corydoras and dwarf cichlids, gain nothing from ongoing salt and can be harmed by it.
• Scaleless fish such as loaches and many catfish are more sensitive to salt than scaled fish are.
• Most aquarium plants tolerate salt poorly, so a planted display is the wrong place for it.
• Salt does not evaporate. Replace it only in proportion to the water you actually change, or the concentration will climb over time.
• Dose by the label for the specific use you have in mind, ideally in a hospital tank where the dose is easy to control.

Other options sit in our salt collection, and staff at the Lethbridge store can tell you whether salt suits the fish you actually keep.