I've started dosing my planted tank with TPN+ & Flouish Excel. I was wondering if you have to remove the Carbon pad from my external filter in order for my plants to get the minerals? As I know the carbon filter need removing when you add fish medication to the tank. Thanks.
Removing carbon when dosing meds is an urban myth. Removing FRESH carbon when dosing meds is what should be said. After a certain amount of time which is argued about by many people the carbon is 'exhausted'. Carbon adsorbs not absorbs so things 'stick' to it rather than being soaked up by it, therefore once it has been covered it is exhausted. It can be recharged apparently by baking at 500F. The times stated for it 'adsorbtion life' are between 24 hours and 1 month but noone agrees After the carbon is exhausted then it becomes standard biomedia so theres no point taking it out for any reason really. I have charcoal in my filter permanently as it has very good surface area The question should be more of should I add carbon rather than should I remove it. If it is already in there then leave it as it is most probably just biomedia now. It it isn't then don't add it. AC
hiya i was going to ask this question as well. ive just changed the carbon fiter pad in my juwel compac filter then started wondering if it would start stripping all the nutriants im adding any advice welcome.
it will remove nutrients, but it certainley wont starve your plants, and after a while it will become saturated anyway meaning any more nutrients you add will stay in the water column.
Carbon filtration is normally used during the initial set-up. At this stage the plant mass is normally fairly small and until new growth begins and the plant mass increases the absorption capacity is limited. Excess nutrients (that can leach from some substrates) and Tannins (from driftwood) can build during this initial period. Using carbon filtration can help adsorb these excesses. As previously mentioned, after this initial period the carbon can be left in the filter to act as bio media. Unless the tank has just been set-up then I would omit the carbon. Cheers Rob
