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Stus Rio 125 re-plant journal

ceg4048 said:
Hi Stu,
All good stuff. As you noted, there's no point upping the lighting until you sort out the flow. TPN+ is the same as TPN but with added NPK so I don't get why you'd need both. If anything you'll be low on NPK. Is your tap high in N & P?
Cheers,

You have the same tap water as me Stu, I think. Therefore, it is very soft with negligible N and P. I like to add a pinch of GH booster at water change, too, just to keep the Mg and Ca levels up a bit.

Your mosses look a bit sorry for themselves. Keep the Easycarbo away from them when you dose, as it can burn them.

Spirogyra thrives in just about any conditions, especially in our water, Stu. Manual removal with frequent water changes is the key, and keep the CO2 good all round the tank. Another black out may help. I have done a black out with Eleocharis without any ill effects. What I would say, though, is don`t prune them just prior to a black out. They will not like that at all.

Your plant mass is on the up, so things should turn for the better. With an improvement in plant health and some careful pruning of the stems and mosses this tank should like terrific.

As for the exposure and amateurish composition of the photograph.....well I can`t help you there. :lol:

Dave.
 
ceg4048 said:
TPN+ is the same as TPN but with added NPK so I don't get why you'd need both. If anything you'll be low on NPK. Is your tap high in N & P? If not, 3ml sounds really low. If you are using a lean mixture to deter the spirogyra that's fine, but if you go too far with this you'll cause more problems than you solve...
I got this from Graham Edwards which he got from tropica whod been having trials of mixing them apparently. I had some TPN spare so thought i'd try a mix which seems to be working well. I have been keeping lean on the amount due to the spirogyra so may start upping the dosage slightly.

aaronnorth said:
Tank is looking good Stu, reminds me of the TGM tank :D
cheers aaron, think its got a long way to go before its up to TGM standards :D

Dave Spencer said:
You have the same tap water as me Stu, I think. Therefore, it is very soft with negligible N and P. I like to add a pinch of GH booster at water change, too, just to keep the Mg and Ca levels up a bit.
with working for the water board I know the location of my water changes regularly between alwen res water and abstracted water from the dee so i think it changes. Watch for when it snows as apparently the melt from the farmers fields always casuses the levels of phosphates and stuff to jump around due to them leaching into the rivers. It is always very soft though so i might do the same with the gh booster as I still got some of this from my RO days.

Dave Spencer said:
Your mosses look a bit sorry for themselves. Keep the Easycarbo away from them when you dose, as it can burn them.
The moss was full of algae so I applied some easycarbo to it at water change and, lets say, left it on a little too long so it resembled my garden at weed/feed time. Its recovering now though with no algae and geting greener so have learned from that little mistake.

Dave Spencer said:
Spirogyra thrives in just about any conditions, especially in our water, Stu. Manual removal with frequent water changes is the key, and keep the CO2 good all round the tank. Another black out may help. I have done a black out with Eleocharis without any ill effects. What I would say, though, is don`t prune them just prior to a black out. They will not like that at all.
Handy tip about the no prune before blackout, ill remember that. doing two large water changes a week at the mo which seems to be working.

Dave Spencer said:
As for the exposure and amateurish composition of the photograph.....well I can`t help you there. :lol:
Git :D ill get there one day...
 
Just a quick update of my tank. Currently on month 5. Just had a trim of the moss and rotala, some of the moss at the front im going to trim some more so it shapes tot he branch going into the aquasoil. No problems with algae at the mo and shrimp are breeding nicely :D

3329806738_474183ba46_o.jpg
 
thanks all, im really pleased with it at the moment and have had no algae issues for a while now. I changed a few things on the tank after advice and help with equipment from here which resulted in the algae just disappearing.

here are the things I changed.

Dumped in 20 red cherry shrimp (they worked wonders on the algae)
upgraded from 900lph sera filter to tetratec ex1200 filter.
moved from a spraybar to inlet and outlet on the back left. outlet runs right along the back then pushes the water left along the front.
lowered dosing, dosing now 2/3rd TPN and 1/3rd TPN+ mixed to 4ml daily, 5ml easycarbo daily now at 3ml.
lowered lighting to 3*24 watt t5 (removed one bulb)
put some activated carbon in the filter.
 
Loving the mosses on the stone, Stu. That`s something I haven`t tried yet, but intend to.

Dave.
 
Superman said:
The photo gives the impression that the tank is huge and not a Rio 125.
I like what you have done and the hairgrass on the right looks fab. I would be inclined to start getting that a bit along the front but a much shorter plant in height, but that's just me.
Cheers SP, id thought about grwoing some hairgrass at the front but im perservering with the HC at the moment as its still slowly spreading. if it ever starts looking straggly ill replace it with hairgrass if ive not taken the tank down by then.

JamesM said:
Wow, 5 months already! Its looking great, Stu, really inviting to the eye :)
Its gone really quick, i had a surprise when I worked out the time the other day !

aaronnorth said:
looking great Stu, that wood looks huge and it gives a great sense of depth.
I really like the redmoore. got some extra bits from TGM the other week but havent put any moss on them yet. think im going to leave them bare as I like the contrast of the brown

Dave Spencer said:
Loving the mosses on the stone, Stu. That`s something I haven`t tried yet, but intend to.
Funily enough some of the fontalus on the stone grew by itself. it must have become detached from the wood, floated around the tank then attached itself and grown. it looks really natural where its landed.
 
Hi Stu,
i just read through the whole journal and i think its a very nice pleasing layout,i especially like the wood coming out of the rock with the moss on,the only thing i would have done different at the start was the lighting duration,i would have started with maybe six hours then upped it gradually,it may have saved you all your algae issues,but thats what makes aquascaping such a good hobby as we are always learning from each other,regards john.
 
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