Input for Dark Start Method

[Aquahorti]

Greetings,

As I am starting a comparative experiment involving a three different methods used when setting up a new aquarium, I am in need of some input for one of the methods.
I will be running the experiment twice, once without CO2 and once with CO2 and setting up three identical aquariums in each of the two runs.
Hardscape will be inert lava rock, Tropica Soil/Powder will be used as well as some inert sand. Each aquarium will have the exact same amount of each of the above mentioned items in it (with an error of 1 gram per substance). Plants used will mainly be Tropicas 1-2 Grow!. Fertilizer will be Tropica Specialised Nutrition and will be using the 90 day guide for the setup period.

My problem is that one of the methods I will be testing is the Dark Start Method (DSM) and I have no pratical experience with this method. I have been reading about it but there seems to be a few different schools on what it is.

The DSM I have been thinking of using is as follows:

1. Add the soil and sand to the aquarium,
2. Fill the aquarium to the maximum filling hight (marked with tape on all three aquariums),
3. Start the filter and cover the aquarium with a dark cover so most visible light will be unable to enter the aquarium,
4. Do a water change every week for five weeks (note evaporation, lower level marks with another piece of tape),
5. Test water from water change,
6. Fill the aquarium up to the maximum filling hight.

Water used will be tap water.

After the five weeks the remains two aquariums will be set up along side the DSM aquarium, adding hardscape and plants to all of them.
Livestock will be added once all aquariums are cycled (Neocaridina ‘Bloody Mary’, Otocinclus and Corydoras habrosus).

Metrics will be pictures and dry matter yield at the end of the experiment.

My question to the users here on UKAPS is the following:

How would you do a five week DSM? ​

It will have to be a five week DSM due to constraints in the test setup.

Thanks.

 

[Tim Harrison]

How would you do a five week DSM?

I don't think I would necessarily. Not sure where this figure of 5 weeks has come from. Seems a bit arbitrary, unless it’s for a specified reason I’m not aware of.

Either way, dark start method, as opposed to dry start method (same initials), seems to have become overly complicated somehow since its initial conception. Not sure why this is, but I suspect our hobby, as always, is overrun by myth, Chinese whispers and just plain old BS...perhaps.

As far as I know, it's really simple, hardscape, AS type substrate, water, plug in filter, leave for 2 weeks. No need for opaque covers to exclude all light (just no aquarium light or direct sunlight, but if you want a repeatable and comparable experiment then covering might be a good idea). And no need for water change.

That's the whole point - no water changes until the dark cycle is up, and then perform a 100% water change. The idea is to leave well alone to avoid the ammonia spike; until the tank cycles enough for ammonia to drop to non-toxic levels. This usually takes a couple of weeks. If you can add mulm from a cycled filter maybe less.

And therefore avoid associated problems such as algae outbreaks etc. Testing not normally required, but if you want test for nitrites and ammonia to be on the safe side.

Anyway, it's how I've done it in the past and as far as I'm aware, mission accomplished.

 

[Ruskie]

I think @Tim Harrison is correct, there’s no real need to over complicate it. Chuck everything together and let it run.

FWIW I’ve literally just completed a dark start although I did do it slightly different to how Tim laid it out above:-

I built the hardscape, set the filter up and flooded the tank. I did cover/wrap the tank but that was just belt and braces really.
I did 50% water changes every week. My main reason for doing this really was just to get extra oxygen in the tank as there was no plant mass and it was a brand new filter/media and I wanted to help the cycle. I guess raising pipes would have had the same effect.
I tested the water, and as I was in no rush, waited until ammonia and nitrites were at 0 before I uncovered and planted. Interestingly this took close to 5 weeks.

 

[Vandal Gardener]

Hi Aquahorti,

Sorry I dont have anything to add but you've described the dark start where's the dry start.

The reason I ask is I have been pondering this exact thing.

I have been contemplating doing the 2 week dark start to get any ammonia spikes out the way then doing a 5-6 week dry start (plants grown emmersed) to try and get a carpet and any delicate stems establish before flooding.

Can anyone confirm if this would be counter productive since draining the tank would kill any beneficial bacteria when its dry?

Hope you dont think I'm hijacking your thread. I am prone to over thinking things and ending up in the wrong place.

Cheers

 

[Tim Harrison]

@Vandal Gardener No need to dark start before dry start. Dry start is best if you want to establish a lawn etc before flooding.

Return of the Shallow

.probably something to do with allelochemicals. Or just simply to fresh.. :) The older and softer the wood the fermer they can and will attach. In nature epiphytes grow on bark or rather aged wood.. I've noticed it with Spiderwood i use emersed it took me over a year to finaly get some mosses...

www.ukaps.org

 

[Mike Singh]

Greetings,

As I am starting a comparative experiment involving a three different methods used when setting up a new aquarium, I am in need of some input for one of the methods.
I will be running the experiment twice, once without CO2 and once with CO2 and setting up three identical aquariums in each of the two runs.
Hardscape will be inert lava rock, Tropica Soil/Powder will be used as well as some inert sand. Each aquarium will have the exact same amount of each of the above mentioned items in it (with an error of 1 gram per substance). Plants used will mainly be Tropicas 1-2 Grow!. Fertilizer will be Tropica Specialised Nutrition and will be using the 90 day guide for the setup period.

My problem is that one of the methods I will be testing is the Dark Start Method (DSM) and I have no pratical experience with this method. I have been reading about it but there seems to be a few different schools on what it is.

The DSM I have been thinking of using is as follows:

1. Add the soil and sand to the aquarium,
2. Fill the aquarium to the maximum filling hight (marked with tape on all three aquariums),
3. Start the filter and cover the aquarium with a dark cover so most visible light will be unable to enter the aquarium,
4. Do a water change every week for five weeks (note evaporation, lower level marks with another piece of tape),
5. Test water from water change,
6. Fill the aquarium up to the maximum filling hight.

Water used will be tap water.

After the five weeks the remains two aquariums will be set up along side the DSM aquarium, adding hardscape and plants to all of them.
Livestock will be added once all aquariums are cycled (Neocaridina ‘Bloody Mary’, Otocinclus and Corydoras habrosus).

Metrics will be pictures and dry matter yield at the end of the experiment.

My question to the users here on UKAPS is the following:

How would you do a five week DSM? ​

It will have to be a five week DSM due to constraints in the test setup.

Thanks.

Hi
What’s is the aim of your experiment?
What are your outcome measures?

 

[Aquahorti]

Hi
What’s is the aim of your experiment?
What are your outcome measures?

Thought that was covered in the first post.

The aim of the experiment is:

a comparative experiment involving a three different methods used when setting up a new aquarium

The outcome measures are:

Metrics will be pictures and dry matter yield at the end of the experiment.

You could translate that into which is better, but how do you measure that? Pictures will give people an idea about how things looked after 125 days/ 90 days and dry matter yield how well the plants have been growing.

The experimental setup is inspired from this methodology: Guidelines for measuring and reporting environmental parameters for experiments in greenhouses - Plant Methods

 

[Aquahorti]

Hi Aquahorti,

Sorry I dont have anything to add but you've described the dark start where's the dry start.

The reason I ask is I have been pondering this exact thing.

I have been contemplating doing the 2 week dark start to get any ammonia spikes out the way then doing a 5-6 week dry start (plants grown emmersed) to try and get a carpet and any delicate stems establish before flooding.

Can anyone confirm if this would be counter productive since draining the tank would kill any beneficial bacteria when its dry?

Hope you dont think I'm hijacking your thread. I am prone to over thinking things and ending up in the wrong place.

Cheers

Dry start is not a part of it because that is a very specific method aimed at a very narrow range of setups. On a personal level I find dry start a waste of time, why go through a dry start when you can grow a HC or Elatine hydropiper carpet in less than a month when planting and then flodding right after having planted?

I am going to hand the results over to Tropica when I am done (after all they provide the soil/plants/ferts, but this does not mean that I am doing this on behalf of Tropica) but who knows if I am able to produce anything useful from this.

 

[Aquahorti]

I don't think I would necessarily. Not sure where this figure of 5 weeks has come from. Seems a bit arbitrary, unless it’s for a specified reason I’m not aware of.

Down to work, I need to have it fit in with my work plans for the next 9 months.

Either way, dark start method, as opposed to dry start method (same initials), seems to have become overly complicated somehow since its initial conception. Not sure why this is, but I suspect our hobby, as always, is overrun by myth, Chinese whispers and just plain old BS...perhaps.

That is why Dark start is part of the experiment, to see if I can get some data that will help people.

As far as I know, it's really simple, hardscape, AS type substrate, water, plug in filter, leave for 2 weeks. No need for opaque covers to exclude all light (just no aquarium light or direct sunlight, but if you want a repeatable and comparable experiment then covering might be a good idea). And no need for water change.

Depending on the substrate you might end up with an environment where you do not get the right bacteria or even to toxic for some of them (have not looked into this particular part of it yet).

That's the whole point - no water changes until the dark cycle is up, and then perform a 100% water change. The idea is to leave well alone to avoid the ammonia spike; until the tank cycles enough for ammonia to drop to non-toxic levels. This usually takes a couple of weeks. If you can add mulm from a cycled filter maybe less.

would never recommend adding mulm. The reason for this is the risk of transferring pathogens, and that you will be transplanting algae spores from the old aquarium to the new. Many spores have among other triggers, light as a key trigger, so they will be dormant until you get the light back on the aquarium.

And therefore avoid associated problems such as algae outbreaks etc. Testing not normally required, but if you want test for nitrites and ammonia to be on the safe side.

Will never add live stock (other than plants) unless I know the aquarium is cycled

Anyway, it's how I've done it in the past and as far as I'm aware, mission accomplished.

 

[Mike Singh]

Thought that was covered in the first post.

The aim of the experiment is:


The outcome measures are:


You could translate that into which is better, but how do you measure that? Pictures will give people an idea about how things looked after 125 days/ 90 days and dry matter yield how well the plants have been growing.

The experimental setup is inspired from this methodology: Guidelines for measuring and reporting environmental parameters for experiments in greenhouses - Plant Methods

Thanks for your reply. This is just the type of real world scientific study aquarists need.

Would you be measuring cycling parameters like: ammonia, nitrites and nitrates? Would you be doing any microbiome analysis?

 

[Tim Harrison]

would never recommend adding mulm. The reason for this is the risk of transferring pathogens, and that you will be transplanting algae spores from the old aquarium to the new. Many spores have among other triggers, light as a key trigger, so they will be dormant until you get the light back on the aquarium.

They’re present anyway. And will be introduced with plants, maybe other than in-vitro. Too much light unbalancing the system is probably an algae trigger. But it perhaps works in synergy with high organics or ammonia and poor maintenance.

Introducing material from a cycled tank has the advantage of introducing an appropriately beneficial microbial community which not only shortens the cycling period but also increases the health of the system.

But these communities exist in dynamic equilibrium in response to environmental factors. So are changing all the time in terms of species composition, richness and diversity.

 

[Vandal Gardener]

Hi Aquahorti,

I want to try the "dry start" because I've never tried it and have enjoyed watching plants develop in a propagate but mainly it gives me time to save for co2 equipment.

Not wanting to sound a pedant because what you're proposing sounds interesting but maybe you should consider changing the title of the thread.

All the best with this.👍

 

[Aquahorti]

Hi Aquahorti,

I want to try the "dry start" because I've never tried it and have enjoyed watching plants develop in a propagate but mainly it gives me time to save for co2 equipment.

Not wanting to sound a pedant because what you're proposing sounds interesting but maybe you should consider changing the title of the thread.

All the best with this.👍

You are right, the title is a brain fart on my part. As you so rightly points out, it should be Dark start.

I am not able to change the title though, will see if an admin can help here.

Once again thanks for pointing out my mistake.

Kind Regards

Edit: never mind, found out how to edit the title…

 

[ElleDee]

I have to start with the standard disclaimer: without replication the strength of the experiment is limited. I know that that's an impractical bar for the hobby, but there's a reason that it is a basic part of research - because without it you have no way of knowing if your results are due to your dependent variable/s or if they are a result of error.
With that out of the way, these are some of my initial thoughts. I agree that adding mulm would be ideal when actually setting up an aquarium, but for the sake of the experiment I wouldn't as it seems like it would add a lot of variation. I would also not include hardscape or sand in the experiment for the same reason.

Some of the other details would depend on the other two methods you are testing, which aren't detailed here. For example, in the real world I wouldn't do a water change during a dark start, but I think you should keep the water change schedule uniform between treatments.

I think you need to think more deeply about your independent variables. Measuring dry matter makes sense as a measure of growth, but "pictures" is not really a metric. You could do a rating system, but you need to be more specific what you are rating. Also, are you lumping all the plant species in the tank together or are you doing separate measurements for each species? Why species are you using and why? I am not being comprehensive here, these are just the first few things that came to mind.

You aren't going to be able to answer all your questions about this topic in one experiment, so you need to figure out which facet is the most important, focus on that, and try to keep everything else as uniform as possible. The more complicated you make it, the more difficult it will be to produce well supported conclusions.

 

[Aquahorti]

Thanks for your reply. This is just the type of real world scientific study aquarists need.

Would you be measuring cycling parameters like: ammonia, nitrites and nitrates? Would you be doing any microbiome analysis?

It is in my mind a bit of a stretch calling it a scientific study, but thanks for the compliment.

The project is more of a hobby project, something I would argue anyone could do if they put their mind to it (I just got there first). For the same reason I will only be doing water chemistry, but I agree it would be very interesting looking at how the aquariums are being populated during the setup period.
I wonder if there are any studies regarding the above and that will be something I will have to start looking for, thanks for giving me something to read up on.
Do you by chance have any reference to articles about it?

 

[Mike Singh]

It is in my mind a bit of a stretch calling it a scientific study, but thanks for the compliment.

The project is more of a hobby project, something I would argue anyone could do if they put their mind to it (I just got there first). For the same reason I will only be doing water chemistry, but I agree it would be very interesting looking at how the aquariums are being populated during the setup period.
I wonder if there are any studies regarding the above and that will be something I will have to start looking for, thanks for giving me something to read up on.
Do you by chance have any reference to articles about it?

Hi
Well you write like an scientist!
No I don’t have any references about my suggestion.