my juwel rio 300

[bizovski]

hi!

This is my rio 300 tank . It is 120x55x60cm. The setup is cca 2,5 years old. Tropica soil 6cm with tabs (dennerle, jbl ).
Daily dosing, macro diy solution NPK 5-4-24 per week, magnesium 2ppm/week. RO 100%, remineralisation partially with dennerle remineral and the rest with mgso4 and calcium sulphate (target is kh2, ca 33, mg 10). WC every week or 10 days 50%.
Micro el profito 45ml/week, additionally easylife ferro 20ml/week (0,57 ppm/week).
Filtration eheim 4+ 600 with eheim substrat pro, original juwel filter with substrat pro, sera siporax, purigen (350ml), 3 sponges, and one tetra ex800 i recently fixed and filled it up with sponge ( fine, medium and coarse sponge).
For additional flow i have stream pump sicce voyager nano. Skimmer eheim.
CO2 with inline diffuser before reactor on eheim filter. Co2 starts 3h before lights. Ph before lights 6,3. Degassed water 7,8.
KH 3, GH 7, tds cca 200-250
Lighting aquagrow uniq fs 900 (cca 130w) + jbl solar natur 57w 105cm. 8h per day

with plants i'm having struggles with rotala macrandra, with ar variegated (after replanting ... when planting invitro perfect, when removing to different area only problems), sometimes problems with AR mini, curling leaves on ludwigia palustris.

The last pic is from yesterday.

Any suggestions? Should i get new soil or just keep it as it is (tabs and more water dosing).

 

[Tim Harrison]

That looks spectacular.

Lighting aquagrow uniq fs 900 (cca 130w) + jbl solar natur 57w 105cm. 8h per day

The lighting combination appears to make the colours pop.

 

[MichaelJ]

with plants i'm having struggles with rotala macrandra, with ar variegated (after replanting ... when planting invitro perfect, when removing to different area only problems), sometimes problems with AR mini, curling leaves on ludwigia palustris.

The last pic is from yesterday.

Any suggestions? Should i get new soil or just keep it as it is (tabs and more water dosing).

What a fantastic looking tank! Colors are really popping as Tim said.

No, don't change the soil. I don't think there would be a good reason to go down that path because of some isolated plant deficiency symptoms. Your tank is mature and your soil contains a great wealth of well established microbial communities which makes all the long-term difference in the world in a planted tank.

With regards to the plant issues, could you post some close up pictures so we can see what is going on? The issues sounds like deficiencies of sorts (could just stem from a couple of minerals lacking in supply), but very specific to certain plants. We have some good experts on the plants you mention.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[bizovski]

What a fantastic looking tank! Colors are really popping as Tim said.

No, don't change the soil. I don't think there would be a good reason to go down that path because of some isolated plant deficiency symptoms. Your tank is mature and your soil contains a great wealth of well established microbial communities which makes all the long-term difference in the world in a planted tank.

With regards to the plant issues, could you post some close up pictures so we can see what is going on? The issues sounds like deficiencies of sorts (could just stem from a couple of minerals lacking in supply), but very specific to certain plants. We have some good experts on the plants you mention.

Cheers,
Michael

thnx, I'll upload some photos

 

[bizovski]

Hi!

This is my progress and how I do it every couple months. At 15. october I pulled everything out and replanted. Beside some plants. I like to vacuum the substrate (soil) from detritus also.
Since last update I added a biomaster 850 and replaced juwel internal filter (found used one without baskets for 70eur, had do buy baskets though). I wanted to get rid of tetra filter but left it also working with fine and medium sponges.

In some pic co2 bubbles can be seen. I have a inline before reactor and haven't cleaned it for ages. This time I cleaned it and the water was sparkling with bubbles after that. Removed it afterwards and only left the reactor. Some say the bubbles are beneficial for the plants but don't know ...

Switched from easylife Profito + Ferro to Flowgrow micro specialized. Didn't notice any improvements. Removed two eheim prefilter segments for the better looks (lol).

Thinking of buying new metering valve for more precise co2 tuning. Now I'm doing 9 bps. Bought a new ph testing pen (HM digital mh-80) to upgrade from cheap ones. Also made diy storage KCl fluid for keeping the pen. The calibrations and storing ... everything has to be so complicated if you want to measure something remotely correct. Also $$$.

Had some local problems with GSA on AR mini, cyano in the substrate on front glass... nothing special

Just some thoughts. Sorry for the grammar if something is off.

 

[seedoubleyou]

Sorry for the grammar if something is off.

Don’t apologise mate, nobody is here to scrutinise anyone.

 

[MaterialCrab]

Looks incredible! This is honestly the type of tank that switched me over to the planted world and hoping I can replicate some of the amazing scapes on this forum.

 

[Cazza]

Looks fantastic- the colour combos really pop.

 

[MaterialCrab]

Beautiful and love the Congo's 😍