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Problem with Riccia

Antoni

Member
Joined
25 Jan 2009
Messages
816
Location
Pompey
Dear fellow hobbyists,
I have a problem with my riccia in the nano tank, you can see the Joural here: viewtopic.php?f=35&t=4545
part of it became whitish and I don't know the reason:

010264802.jpg


Is it possible this to be a deficiency? I'm adding Dupla Plant 24 and glutaraldehide(as a source of CO2, instead of EasyCarbo), but because the Dupla 24 is so concentrated I diluted with water to get the dosage right. As it consist helate FE, is it possible the Micros to become useless in this solution?
 
Hi,
Very nice tank! Generally Riccia does not respond well to Gluteraldehyde, which is the principal component of Excel/Easycarbo. How long have you been using it on the Riccia? it would be surprising if it lasted very long but perhaps small doses are the secret.

Cheers,
 
Thank you, guys!
Yes I thought that it could be the glutaraldehide, because I had problems with the valisneria once.
I do use small doses (0,2 ml per day, which came from the general role to add a ml per 40 L). Interesting fact is, that in the initial period(first 3-4 weeks ) I used to put more than that, because I wanted to prevent an algae out break and the riccia was pearling. :?:
Is it possible the fact that I diluted the Dupla Plant 24 with water and keep using this solution for 2 weeks to nullify the effect of the fertilizer?
 
Just to share with you, that the tank is getting slowly better and IMO the reason is lack of nutrients.
I have diluted the Dupla 24 in water to match the recommended dosage and probably this had caused a PH change, which could be enough for all types of Fe (DTPA,EDTA ) to become useless for the plants. 2 days ago I have started to dose from the concentrated Dupla 24 in very small portions, hopefully this will improve things .

Regards
 
as clive suggest easycarbo is to riccia ,what cyanide is to us in large doses. i can vouch for that as i lost all my riccia to an overdose of easycarbo
 
Hi Antoni,
Not wishing to start a flame war or anything like that but is there a special reason that you are using Dupla? I only mention this because they wrote the original programming code for The Matrix in the 1990's. It was assumed that everyone would be happy in this "perfect world". It was a disaster. They priced themselves into oblivion and their secret formula was discovered by clever chemists who had access to a spectrometer: The Krib: Dupladrops exposed

That particular analysis is a decade old, but essentially fertilizer products are all the same and if you just wanted to buy a fertilizer with trace elements and Potassium there are a lot of cheaper alternatives you can get from our sponsors or from the web. You can save yourself even more money by using the dry powders as discussed in EI DOSING USING DRY SALTS

If access is not a problem you would be well advised to try TPN+ all-in-one. You can even duplicate the formula as discussed by JamesC James' All In One Solution

In fact you'll find that it is completely unnecessary to dose precisely. You only ever need to meet or exceed the minimum requirements. This makes life a lot simpler.

CO2 is a different story though. If you stop using a liquid carbon how else will you get CO2 into the tank? Depending on your lighting you may have other problems.

Cheers,
 
ceg4048 said:
CO2 is a different story though. If you stop using a liquid carbon how else will you get CO2 into the tank? Depending on your lighting you may have other problems.

Cheers,

Clive, if you read his journal, he's using soda water to supply the CO2.

I don't know that much about using soda water, but doesn't some (all?) contain bicarbonates? I'd imagine with certain plants it might be easy to overdo it. I remember reading somewhere that kH is the type of hardness that plants are affected by the most. Whereas GH just needs to be present at reasonable levels, certain plants have more specific requirements when it comes to kH.

I'm just thinking out loud. Out of interest, what kind of soda water are you using?
 
KH is the measure of carbonates and bicarbonates but only some plants can use them for a Carbon source by Biogenic decalcification.

Soda water will only have a very temporary effect on the CO2 as the CO2 will rapidly come out of solution. Just think what happens when you leave a bottle of pop open - it soon goes flat as the CO2 escapes from solution.

As to KH's effect on plants; I use water with 0dKH and the plants do fine! Except those that those like Vallis that require harder water. However if I ran the tank with 0dGH I would get deficiencies quickly.
 
Ed Seeley said:
As to KH's effect on plants; I use water with 0dKH and the plants do fine! Except those that those like Vallis that require harder water. However if I ran the tank with 0dGH I would get deficiencies quickly.

That's kind of what I said. GH just needs to be present.

I was thinking more about kH toxicity, than deficiency. Adding soda water - for the CO2, not for the bicarbonates - without monitoring the kH could lead to high levels. I don't know what adding lots of bicarbonates would do to a tank. I've never done it. On the tropica website, it says a ph of 8 is high for Riccia. It's not inconceivable adding soda water - without paying attention to kH - that you could exceed that. If it's sodium bicarbonate you are adding - and it usually is with soda water - it will also change the osmotic pressure. Again, I don't know whether that's good or bad for plants. I know it's bad for fish.

One time I added mineral water to a vase with curly bamboo in it. The leaflet that came with the bamboo said it was practically impossible to kill. After I added the mineral water, it was dead in 24 hours.
 
scottturnbull said:
I was thinking more about kH toxicity, than deficiency. Adding soda water - for the CO2, not for the bicarbonates - without monitoring the kH could lead to high levels. I don't know what adding lots of bicarbonates would do to a tank. I've never done it. On the tropica website, it says a ph of 8 is high for Riccia. It's not inconceivable adding soda water - without paying attention to kH - that you could exceed that. If it's sodium bicarbonate you are adding - and it usually is with soda water - it will also change the osmotic pressure. Again, I don't know whether that's good or bad for plants. I know it's bad for fish.

I've not heard of KH toxicity. Rapidly changing water parameters is a good way to cause problems in any direction but I've not heard of any specific issues with KH being toxic. Some plants prefer lower pHs that are usually prevalent in low KH water.

Is soda water really that high in NaHCO3? I always thought it was called soda water because it was often dispensed from a soda syphon or various compunds were added for flavour, rather than any link with Sodium bicarbonate?
 
Ed Seeley said:
I've not heard of KH toxicity. Rapidly changing water parameters is a good way to cause problems in any direction but I've not heard of any specific issues with KH being toxic. Some plants prefer lower pHs that are usually prevalent in low KH water.

Is soda water really that high in NaHCO3? I always thought it was called soda water because it was often dispensed from a soda syphon or various compunds were added for flavour, rather than any link with Sodium bicarbonate?

I've not heard of kH toxicity either. But I've never heard of people dosing Soda Water either. That's why I'm thinking it might be a problem, in this instance. It's the one aspect of the OPs tank that is out of the ordinary.

I read wikipedia, sodium bicarbonate is added to neutralise the acidic flavour. I don't think it's necessarily high in Sodium Bicarbonate, although it might be by aquarium standards. The OP is adding it as top up water.

People who add Sodium Bicarbonate usually do so very carefully, monitoring the kH. In his journal, the OP says he isn't monitoring anything.

Ordinarily, I'd agree with you. At low levels, kH doesn't really matter, except with Vallis etc.

Of course, if the OP is using his own soda water, from a syphon, without adding sodium bicarbonate, then all this is moot.
 
Hi Scott,
Carbonate toxicity is not really a concern as most plants can tolerate very high KH without difficulty. One is much more likely to run into Sodium toxicity issues before carbonate issues actually.

Cheers,
 
OK I will try to spread some light on this topic, based only on my experience and observations:
As I have written earlier this method is used by Oliver Knot.
Indeed I haven't been testing at all, but I will do this today. I have a test for KH and will share with you the results. Tab water, where I live is 3KH and Ph is 7,2 accordingly to the Sera test kit (as long as it could be trusted).
At the moment I haven't seen any problem using soda water, the riccia is pearling, Hemianthus micranthemoides and HC as well. The red cherries are in this tank already 7-8 days and feel fine.
The only thing I have noticed is a film on the surface, which form for a day.

The problem that I have encountered with the riccia was a result of using Glutaradehide. Now I'm not using it.

About the soda getting flat, I'm using small bottle of soda(.500 l) which lasts for three days and IMO it is still fizzy on the third day.

My major concern is about the rapid changes in the CO2 levels using soda water, because whole amount is added once a day.

I did start this method as a test, wanting to see is it convenient using it for small tanks.

About Dupla:
ceg4048 » Sun Feb 01, 2009 5:21 pm
Hi Antoni,
Not wishing to start a flame war or anything like that but is there a special reason that you are using Dupla? I only mention this because they wrote the original programming code for The Matrix in the 1990's. It was assumed that everyone would be happy in this "perfect world". It was a disaster. They priced themselves into oblivion and their secret formula was discovered by clever chemists who had access to a spectrometer: The Krib: Dupladrops exposed

Well I didn't know that. I'm using a EI method on my bigger thanks, but when I bought my CO2 system from Dupla(they gave me really good price in Germany) I have ordered a bottle of 24 also, just for a try.

Other thing is that over here, there aren't many quality products presented. The only thing u can get is Sera, JBL or Tetra.

I'm working on the all in one solution, just have some problems figuring out the right amount in the micros to add. I intend to use Tenso Cocktail for supplying micros, but the proportions are as follows:
Tenso_1_29_08_08_en.jpg


This is different story any way.

CO2 is a different story though. If you stop using a liquid carbon how else will you get CO2 into the tank? Depending on your lighting you may have other problems.
I could use the conventional method by using my pressurized system or making a Yeast mix, but as I said earlier I wanted to try something different :)

Regards
 
Antoni Dimitrov said:
I could use the conventional method by using my pressurized system or making a Yeast mix, but as I said earlier I wanted to try something different :)

I'm interested to hear how it works out. It's a neat idea for Nanos, if it works. Are you using regular bottled soda water? I did some reading, and could find very little information on the subject, apart from this.

Best of luck.
 
Here are the results from the KH test.
For this aim I have used standart KH test of Sera.
I have tested the water in the tank, tab water, which I use and the soda water. The results are as follows:
Tank water: KH 7
Tab water: KH 2
Soda water: KH 9
The conclusion is, that the soda water affects the KH and maybe the Ph, I dont have tests right now.
I supose this will affect the development of the plants, particularly the hemianthus. Also when I do water changes, this will be a stress for both plants and shrimps.
So I think I'm going back to conventional method of DIY yeast mix, as I don't want to place CO2 tubings across the room (other tanks or on the oposite side :( )
Regards
 
Antoni Dimitrov said:
Here are the results from the KH test.
For this aim I have used standart KH test of Sera.
I have tested the water in the tank, tab water, which I use and the soda water. The results are as follows:
Tank water: KH 7
Tab water: KH 2
Soda water: KH 9
The conclusion is, that the soda water affects the KH and maybe the Ph,
Yeah but so what? Here is HC at KH of about 10 and GH 20:
2081463940038170470S600x600Q85.jpg


I think people obsess much too much about KH and pH. I've seen no evidence that either of these parameters affect plant growth (at least the vast majority of species.) Poor CO2 and poor nutrient levels on the other hand, have a dramatic effect on growth.

Cheers,
 
Hi Ceg,

I thought you didn't beleive in testing water perameters? Is this your tank and if so how do you know the KH and GH values?
 
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