Further tweaks and early indicators!

[Tom Raffield]

Hi everyone,

Some of you may have read or been aware of the long thread I started a good number of months ago about the issues I was having with my tank. Since then I have made some changes and have recently replanted a section of the tank, removing plants that were a little too worse for wear. They have been in for 4 days now and, due to my previous issues, I am a little paranoid but also interested to watch for any changes and possible early indications to problems.

• Crypts remain from when the tank was started. The following all took place 4 days ago.
• I added some Amazon Swords and they almost immediately showed negative signs (see photos). I believe that swords take time to adapt to a new environment so am hoping this is just the plant making itself at home.
• I replanted a monte carlo carpet - too early to say how this is doing.
• I added some Java Fern attached to rocks. Appears to be ok.
• And at the back, as a nutrient sponge and hoping it grows quite tall, hygrophilia polysperma. This, I think, is showing slight discolouration around the leaf edges and are the leaf veins very dark compared to the leaf itself? (see photos).

My current tank regime and setup, due to the changes I have made, is as follows:

• EI Dosing (with 50% water change weekly) using salts mixed in water following instructions supplied although I have reduced/removed phosphates as my tank was through the roof on these. 50ml macros and then 50ml micros on alternate days. A good local aquatic store tested for phosphates and whilst the test is supposed to take up to 10 minutes the colour had gone off the scale even as the indicator solution was being added. I also asked them to check my tap water which came back with a high phosphate reading so the plants should obtain enough from my water changes.
• Add Flourish Excel liquid carbon at 15ml a day.
• Juwel Vision 260 tank using 2xT5 tubes - 7 hour photoperiod. I had reduced the photoperiod when my troubles started to 3 or 4 hours. Never increased it again and was advised that the plants may be suffering from lack of light.
• Juwel filter removed and a Fluval FX4 added.
• Gas CO2 injection using CO2 art equipment and an atomic atomiser bazooka. Bubble count is too fast to physically count but both drop checkers (4dkh solution) show green at lights on and remain so throughout the photoperiod. The bazooka is directly under the water outlet to the filter so the bubbles are immediately gobbled up into that - hoping they have longer to dissolve through the filter; is this a good idea?
• Fluval FX4 outlets to the tank were removed and a custom 1m spray bar created. This sits an inch down at the back of the tank with the holes aimed forward and slightly down to minimise surface agitation. This was added to attempt to create better flow and distribution of nutrients in the tank. When I lower the water level to below the bar, the water 'jets' from the spray bar reach a third or so across the tank.
• Gravel substrate plus old eco-complete. Due to this I have recently added JBL Kugeln 7+13 balls throughout the tank.
• IDEA - I am tempted to buy a pH pen to do a profile of the tank over a day (30 or 60 min intervals). Would this be useful?

So, that is pretty much me and my fish tank in a nut shell. Please have a look at the photos and see what you think. Is there anything I have missed? Are the plants already showing early indications of a problem? Is there anything further I can do?

If there are upcoming issues I am somewhat stumped as to what to try next. If it is a further flow issue and therefore CO2 distribution what can I attempt? Is it too little CO2, could I add more Excel? Could it be a lighting issue as the T5s are over a year old, would an upgrade to something more versatile like LEDs which can be turned up/down be better? Is it a deficiency in nutrients in which case what more can I add?
As always, I thank anyone and everyone who shares their views. I have worked super hard to try and get this tank back on track as I was on the brink of giving up.

 

[ian_m]

Couple of points.

- Virtually everyone who has ever rolled their own variation of EI ends up with plant deficiencies or algae. Keep adding phosphate there is no issue if in excess, though definitely issues if not present.
- As you are dosing EI the phosphate test of tank water should most likely be ignored as it likely to be wrong.
- Same with phosphate test of tap water, incorrect readings due to either nitrate and chlorine. Phosphate is dosed to tap water (to max 0.5mg/l ?) in soft water areas with lead piping present, so if you are reading anything above this the test kit is wrong.
- Read this on why test kits are not needed. https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/what-about-test-kits.52487/
- Your plants are showing "mechanical damage" which indicates either fish eating them or more likely poor CO2 levels and distribution.
- I very very very very much doubt you will achieve anywhere near proper CO2 flow and distribution using a bazooka. Most CO2 will escape as well as not getting CO2 around all the tank. You really should be using inline diffuser on a tank and filter this size.
- Nice spray bar by the way. Can you post a picture of water lowered 50% and spray bar on. Water should hit the front glass, with some force hopefully, not dribble into the lowered water. I suspect you need to reduce the number of holes to get such a flow pressure/rate. Experiment by taping up every other hole as an easy first start.
- The T5 HO tubes in a Juwel tank (have you got reflectors ?) easily place the tank in high light region. I know of virtually no one who has suffered poor plants due to lack of light, I don't know who told you that.
- 7 hours is a reasonable time, so you have a decent tank viewing time. Just get things more slightly sorted before moving to 7 (or more) hours.
- T5 tubes last years, I have had 3 year old T5 tubes next to 3 month old T5 tubes and you will be pushed to tell the difference.
- pH pen is a good idea, you are aiming for a drop of 1pH from CO2 to when the lights come on. CO2 on 2 hours before lights on is a good start.

 

[Iain Sutherland]

So i just wrote a nice long reply to this on my phone then it crapped itself so your getting the abrieviated version...

My first planted tank was a 260 vision and i remember not so fondly what a pain in the blahblahblahblah it was as the bow front buggers up all the normal flow patterns. There are a couple of journals still floating around from my time of first getting it and throwing stuff in and the second 'proper scape' which may have a few helpful words in it, just probably not from me, however it was nearly 10 years ago so no promises...

It would say first off that the changes you have made are all in the right direction, you seem to understand the basic principles and now its all about tweaking things until they are right. Just dont tweak too often or you wont see when things arer going right!

Both swords and polysperma are both grown emersed and the die back is pretty normal, certainly very typical of the swords in they slowly yellow and then brown. As you see them looking obviously sad then just snip off that leaf, new imersed growth will soon fill it in. Especially given the other Echinodorus look good you should worry. The polysperma looks to have some nice new growth at the tips so just hold fire and see what happens with new growth, all emersed poly sperma leaves will die off at which point you can just pull them, trim off and replant the new imersed growth which should hopefully stay a nice fresh green colour.

As Ian said the spray bars would ideally get further than the third of the way across the tank you stated so try blocking every other hole to get more velocity. Also as Ian said the in tank bazooka will make it harder to get co2 optimal, inline is a much more effective solution.

PH profile will help a lot if your are willing to buy a PH pen, the cheap ones are pretty good for what you need it for.

Double dosing excel isnt an issue if you want to, may not be necessary though...

Forget about your lights, i upgraded the T8's to T5's in the vision and most plants i wanted grew, given you have relatively low demand plants then you would have any issue at all.

Ultimately 4 days isnt long to see much change, play with your spray bar and do a ph profile if you can but otherwise just be patient, reevaluate in a week but watch daily, idle hands do the devils work!!

 

[Tom Raffield]

Thanks for the responses Ian and Iain. I really have been working so hard on the tank in recent months investing a lot of hours and money so am pleased that I am on the right lines. In reply to both your messages:

- I do have reflectors for the T5s but I do not use these. Should I continue without them?
- pH pen is on order. I will post the results of the profile when I get the chance to do it next week.
- @Iain Sutherland The bow front! I had never even considered this to cause a problem but of course it must do. Simple science would dictate that it will mess up the flow with water deflecting off the glass at odd angles. Is there anything I can do about this? Thinking about this further I imagine the back corners might be problem areas for flow (especially as my bar does not extend to the extremities of the width). Could I add a couple of holes in the bar pointing straight down in an attempt to get the water moving or would this be a bad idea? Could I point the whole bar straight down the back rather than forward - I can only imagine this making matters worse?
- @ian_m I purchased 3 x 3m lengths of pipe and so far have used one. I can tape some of the holes to see if I can increase the pressure and then drill a new one as necessary. However, should I do this with caution? The bar was constructed attempting to match the area of the Fluval tube entering the bar to the area created by the number of holes. These areas are almost identical after some guidance but have obviously led to the pressure being limited. Will decreasing the number of holes not put unnecessary pressure on the filter? Or even reduce the turnover of the filter from being 10x to much less? Fluval also, when I asked them about a spray bar for the FX4, suggested that back pressure could be an issue and advised me not to make one. But again as they have no official bar available I am not surprised at this so I can not go back to them and complain if I cock up the filter!
- An inline diffuser would be a good idea. However, compared to what I had previously (ladders etc) the bazooka is probably my best to date. Due to the placement of the bazooka, the bubbles enter the filter directly with none reaching the surface so has the filter itself not become a diffuser in itself? Adversely, could this damage my filter and components in the long term? Has anyone ever come across an inline diffuser that will fit the FX4 / FX6 tubing size? The fact it is also ribbed might make life more difficult too. I would be keen to explore this option if it will help with matters but am unsure where to start.
edit: Just discovered this video (Youtube: How to: Install Up Aqua Inline Diffuser To Your Fluval Canister Filter). Would this work with my FX4, I think the video is about an older Fluval filter? I'd be a little scared of water leaking out the connections.

I am away for a few days now so the tank will have a chance to adapt to my latest changes. I will post about the results when I return and take photos as necessary. In the meantime, any further ideas, tips and suggestions would be most welcome.

 

[Tom Raffield]

Following some more research over the weekend and speaking to both CO2 Supermarket and CO2 Art, I have been advised that the only way forward for an inline diffuser on an FX4 hose would be to do a DIY job. One of the two also stated that an in-tank bazooka would achieve the same results (this is currently what I run although I am pumping CO2 bubbles straight into the filter which can't be healthy in the long term). Has anyone managed to create a setup with an FX4 or FX6 which uses an inline diffuser (or perhaps a reactor, although these are more pricey)?

Also, reading more into spray bars I clearly need to increase the pressure. To do this I would need to reduce the number of holes in my current bar; I have no problem doing this but do I need to be considering the area of the holes combined and the area of the hosing? By shutting off a number of holes I do not want to cause issues within the filter or hose. The spray initially was constructed using careful measurements - I could always go for 3/4 or half the number of holes but make them larger to compensate but would this achieve more pressure?

I imagine that tweaking the spray bar is my best (and cheapest) option at first alongside a pH profile of the tank over a day. Then, if things do not improve I could target the diffuser situation. Please let me know your thoughts. Mods, is it ok to repost in the relevant sub forums (filters and CO2) to get better coverage or do users generally browse all forums in ukaps?

 

[ian_m]

This is how you fit a 16mm diffuser into 25mm piping and not reduce flow, curtesy of plumber extraordinaire Zeus.

https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/olympus-is-calling.43046/#post-461575

And like this.
https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/olympus-is-calling.43046/page-2#post-469673

https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/olympus-is-calling.43046/page-3#post-475073

 

[Tom Raffield]

Just got back from 4 days away and have taken these snaps of the tank and can make the following observations.

- The swords have grown a little and seem to look ok. A few holes and areas of discolouration but these were the original leaves when the plants were put into the tank. Is the dark veins on the leaves normal? I don't recall seeing these before I went away.
- Hygrophilia polysperma has shot up a few inches. Lower leaves look a little tatty which could be expected. Leaves higher up the plant are getting the orange/yellow edge that the old plants had before I binned them?
- Monte Carlo hasn't done a lot but from I remember last time I planted this carpet it took a good few weeks to get going.
- There is evidence of some green spot algae and other algae on the glass of the tank but in small quantities.
- Both drop checkers are a nice green (at time of checking when I walked in) but I will attempt to do a pH profile tomorrow to see what that shows.

Can anyone make comments on what they can see? I imagine that 'flow' is the underlining issue here. Especially with my spray bar only reaching 1/3 to a 1/2 way across the tank. Time to play around with the spray bar? Although I wouldn't mind some advice on what would happen if I closed 1/3 of the holes off - I know pressure would increase which is what I am after but would flow take a big hit? Considering the tank is 260l and the Fluval FX4 is more than adequate for a tank of this size - would it matter? Should I be making a new spray bar with larger holes but less of them?