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the adventure begins...

Hi @deadlus3d

That was quick! May I ask what you decided about lighting and a carbon fertilizer? Going back over your thread, I see that some fertilizer suggestions have already been made. So, I suspect your fertilizer question has already been answered. Yes/No?

JPC
 
deadlus3d said:
Some of the Val's are already melting and some of the Amazon swords too.
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This is quite standard reaction of the plants to low levels of available carbon and it's a part of photorespiration (plants are actually consuming certain amounts of oxygen instead of carbon).
Without going into too much details: your plants are outgassing unnecessary Nitrates in a form of ammonia (NH3) as they are not able to bond them with Carbon and Magnesium to form a chlorophyll cells because there is not too many Carbon molecules available to be bonded with N and Mg. This quite often results in algae outbreak (usually BBA and staghorn algae as they are opportunists and will very likely appear at elevated levels of ammonia).

If it's low tech it can be relatively easy combatted with dosing of either glutaraldehyde, citric acid or spirit vinegar - all of them will end up as CO2, either consumed by bacteria outgassing CO2 or as a form of reaction which will release CO2 into water.

deadlus3d said:
ok i got my answer here but as i am low tech i would like a suggestion regarding which fertilizer to buy.
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What about dosing dry (or more conveniently mixed with water) salts instead of using ready made ferts? It will be definitely cheaper in long run and it will allow you to change proportions of certain ferts if needed.
As a starting point I'd suggest to get some KNO3 (source of Potassium and Nitrates), KH2PO4 (mainly source of Phosphorus), MgSO4 (source of Mg) and KH2CO3 (additional source of Potassium - it's usually needed in amounts higher than coming only from KNO3) and some micro fertilizer (Fe plus other micro).
Then (as a starting point which can be easily adapted) you could dose weekly (approximately):
5ppm of Nitrates
0.5 - 1ppm of Phosphates
6-10ppm of Potassium
0.1ppm of Fe plus other micro
above are only a guess and I'd suggest to increase your plant mass at least 2x by the way - this will increase biological stability of the tank.
And additionally dose glutaraldehyde/citric acid/spirit vinegar as a source of Carbon - for 180l tank 1,5g of citric acid daily will end up as approx 13ppm of CO2, same with 10% 15ml of spirit vinegar (appr. 16ppm). Not sure about glut as it depends on the source of it you may want to use (and percentage amount of it in the solution)
 
would it be possible to add liquid carbon now that there is no livestock in the tank but stop once the fish are added?
i am worried i could end up dosing too much liquid carbon and kill livestock.
thanks
 
deadlus3d said:
would it be possible to add liquid carbon now that there is no livestock in the tank but stop once the fish are added? i am worried i could end up dosing too much liquid carbon and kill livestock.
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Hi @deadlus3d

I am interested that you are reluctant to use liquid carbon when there are livestock present. I have used Seachem Excel many times in one of my fish tanks with no adverse effects whatsoever. As with lots of things, there is a safe range of dosages but, provided that you don't exceed the manufacturer's recommended dose, you should have no reason to be concerned about your livestock.

JPC
 
Witcher said:
...for 180l tank 1,5g of citric acid daily will end up as approx 13ppm of CO2...
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Hi @Witcher

I doubt that @deadlus3d has a scale capable of accurately measuring 1.5g - but I may be wrong. So, there could be a problem with this suggestion. This would also apply to dry-dosing with the other ferts. But, your suggestions are nevertheless very interesting. Do you dry-dose citric acid as a source of CO2? Is it workable? Presumably, it would be necessary to keep topping this up throughout the day? And, CO2 would surely fluctuate as a result? In order to avoid the OP's thread going off at a tangent, perhaps you could start a separate thread?

JPC
 
Just an update, I have covered a whole tube with foil and covered 30% of the second tube and the algae seems to be dying off. there are some snails in the tank so I don't know
if it is the light change or the snail killing off the bba.....
I have added another three Egeria Densa and wated to add some Vallisn Americana but here in the UK no one seems to have it in stock at the moment.

I have decided against liquid carbon as I don't trust myself to provide the right dosage. I would like to add a little bit of this:
https://www.pro-shrimp.co.uk/plant-...21ofE1Me30fLH7ohyxVOuyMPsXzet9WMaAtnEEALw_wcB

do you think this would be a good addition to my low tech which already has bermuda compost in the substrate
 
Hi @deadlus3d
deadlus3d said:
I have decided against liquid carbon as I don't trust myself to provide the right dosage. I would like to add a little bit of this:
https://www.pro-shrimp.co.uk/plant-...21ofE1Me30fLH7ohyxVOuyMPsXzet9WMaAtnEEALw_wcB

do you think this would be a good addition to my low tech which already has bermuda compost in the substrate
Click to expand...

I think you'll find that Tropica Premium Fertiliser only contains micro and trace elements. What's needed is carbon in some form. Or, reduce the lighting intensity and duration as this should reduce the amount of carbon needed by your plants. Having said that, the use of Tropica Premium Fertiliser shouldn't do any harm.

It's your call.

JPC
 
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