WAUKESHA, Wis. — Now that Waukesha has fully transitioned to Lake Michigan as its water source, businesses such as Easy Aqua Fish & Coral are starting to see the benefits.

Dominic Martino owns Easy Aqua Fish & Coral. Since he became the owner, Martino said he’s been preparing for the city to transition its water source from a deep-water aquifer to Lake Michigan.

“I have been storing about 300 to 400 gallons of the previous system’s reverse osmosis water,” Martino said. “So I can now tie that into the new reserve osmosis water and allow my animals to adjust to the chemistry in a lot more positive way where they will take to it a lot healthier.”

Martino has also stopped using a reverse osmosis system for the time being. He encouraged other fish and reptile owners in Waukesha to do the same.

He said that’s because the chloramine and metal levels are higher in Waukesha’s water system during the city’s first month of using Lake Michigan water.

“After that first month, the reverse osmosis system will actually have an easier job and will last longer with the less hard water,” he said. “That will cause these different filters to extend their life to double what they could beforehand.”

Martino said he believes by now having access to Lake Michigan water it could expand what Easy Aqua Fish & Coral can do.

“We won’t have to do adjustments of water coming out of the tap,” said Martino. “It should be as easy as pulling the water out of the tap and adding a higher quality dechlorinator and we will be good to go with a ton of more species that weren’t necessarily options in Waukesha […] before.”

Martino said he hopes everyone can get the most out of what the Lake Michigan water can offer the community.