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'Pot' scape - one WC in 2 months !!!!

Still messing with this tank, mainly big trims every so often. I Have noticed the AS does seem to get bunged up with detritus in the pots esp after cutting plants off at substrate level and repeated replanting. Also with my hard water I feel the AS may of exhausted its CEC ( Cation Exchange Capacity). Plants seems to do equally well without being planted in ASbut may be beniffing for the AS in other pots

So I have a big trim off my 500l coming up and was after some more Eleocharis acicularis as removing the Riccia from the carpet has depleted the Eleocharis acicularis as it tends to grow higher in the the carpet of Lilaeopsis brasiliensis, so the Eleocharis acicularis gets pulled out removing the Riccia, so the Lilaeopsis brasiliensis is out competing the Eleocharis acicularis.

So will be needing some Eleocharis acicularis to replanted carpet after massive trim off Lilaeopsis brasiliensis so thought I would get some more in production.

Plus to make things more interesting using an inert substrate, so used some sand in some pots and potting grit in others.
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Also ordered some Urea Prills after reading Dosing with Ammonia and Urea as having no fish in the tank a low dose of Urea with NO3 might help some off the plants. Not for the faint hearted using Urea.

But will be interesting to see how the Alternanthera reineckii, Hygrophila pinnatifida and Staurogyne repens do with the changes as they have never done well before.
 
Hi all, Certainly isn't. If you didn't mind mucking about with the levels of the other nutrients you could use <"Miracle Gro"> as your urea source. It is <"really cheap"> to buy.

cheers Darrel

Never thought about that :rolleyes: and an NPK 24-8-16 I could of worked with that :oops:

already ordered 500grams from ebay Urea 97.5% prills £5.95

It might be worth checking that the Urea you plan on using is low in Biuret, because the application method (dosing in the water) will be equivalent to foliar feeding in terrestrial crops and that is recommended to have a Biuret content of around 0.3% for safety.

Biuret in Urea Fertilisers

:)

Cheers M8 :thumbup: it doesn't mention Biuret in the listing so I will keep an eye out for yellowing of the leaves.

Been giving it some thought and I think I should be good for dosing 6-7ppm NO3 with the Urea Prills as that's the equivalent dose the ADA Mighty brighty and Tropica Specialised Nutrition yield weekly

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Hi all,
with the Urea Prills
The actual prills may be physically quite large. It depends on the spreader they are intended for.
500grams from ebay Urea 97.5% prills £5.95
Should be all right, I'd probably try and avoid the really cheap ones sold for de-icing, for the reason @X3NiTH mentions.

cheers Darrel
 
The actual prills may be physically quite large. It depends on the spreader they are intended for.

Think their large size may come in handy, count out 100 weigh them, mass per unit work out the yield for given tank then maybe one prill on macro day or one prill dissolve in 100ml water add say 15ml on macro day. Gives an easy way to see how the plants/inmates respond without making up 500ml of macros, plus easy to stop
 
This scape brings back distant memories... :thumbup: In my very first community aquarium in the 1970s, housed a couple of Kribs and used an upside-down Terracotta pot i nibbled an extra hole in, for them to enter and make a nest. And they did rather soon have babies.

I don't know why I never had Kribs again because it was the most beautiful play I've ever observed. Mommy bringing babies back into the pot at nightfall and the little rascals escape again trough to hole in the roof keeping mommy bussy. 🥰

Can't help seeing Kribs in this pot scape... :)
 
Urea turned up today

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the Prills wasnt as uniform I as hoped
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So scrapped the counting idea.

Did the maths for my 50l tank (just happened to have a handy calculator to do it on ;))

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So weighed out 4.0 grams and added 100 ml of RO water wait 10 minutes till dissolved, quick stir then dosed 1ml to 50l tank.

dose x3 week to yield 1.14 ppm N or 5.01 ppm NO3
 
Cheers M8 :thumbup: it doesn't mention Biuret in the listing so I will keep an eye out for yellowing of the leaves.
Late to the party but here is my go. I have read that all Urea will contain Biuret. That's due to the manufacturing process. No way around that. This said depending on how it was manufactured, levels of Biuret will vary, so yours will contain some.
 
Been some time since I updated this 'experimental/practice' tank/journal, but learning lots from it.

Moved just over two months ago, which was a trying time moving everything all my tanks and one being 500l. To make things worse I injured myself and could hardy walk, been slowly getting better. But as a consequence tank maintenance went out the window and had to do the plumbing to mix the water. Both tanks have suffered esp the 'Pot' scape with it being high tech, I converted the 500l to low tach before the move.
last night was the fist clean in two months and tanks had had a WC about 4 weeks ago, it wasn't looking good at all and the 500L filter was making burping noises :eek: so was producing some gases and didn't sound healthy at all.
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The tank had RCS, Ramshorns and MTS. None of the RCS survived 😨 in the Pot scape and never seen the filter sponges so dirty. It was pretty shameful. Had sons spare 60l tank handy which made the process much easier. put all plants in 60L cleaned tank in garden cleaned filters, trimmed plants and fill it all.
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The 500l had plenty of RCS so thought clean the filter and resolve the loss.

Thought wrong big time, no RCS in FX6 filter and sponges dirty beyond belief. It was gone 1.00am when I got done.

The 500l tank still had plenty of RCS so when I feed them tonight scooped about 50 out to replenish the 50l.

The moral of the story/post Water Changes (WC) are critical esp in high tech tanks, if they do't happen you your tanks livestock will suffer. The plants may look fine but I am sure they paid the price as well.
 
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