Dirted tank startup failure - advice needed

[threnjen]

Hey friends,

I'm starting a new 5.5 dirted with an inert black sand cap. The dirt is Miracle Gro organic potting soil. The light is a 15W full spectrum compact fluorescent.

I did do a lot of research first and decided not to remineralize the soil, because the tank would have a filter.

I moved over several plants from my other tanks, including:
Didiplis diandra
Cardamine lyrata
Dwarf saggitaria
Vesuvius sword
Ruffled aponogeton
Crypt Lutea

Startup was rough as the filter I purchased (Tom Aquarium mini internal filter) was all but useless. The water was basically stagnant. Within a few days, the top of the water developed a repulsive brown scum. After 5 days I overnighted an emergency nano HOB Azoo Palm 60. I'm now running both and there is plenty of agitation and movement in the tank.

At this point however, most of the original plants have died. I can't figure out if it's due to light or if they are getting burned by the overly rich substrate. They have never been in an active substrate before, only inert substrate with root tabs. The cardamine lyrata has totally melted away. The diandra is thin, ragged and brown. Everything looks pretty bad.

I'm attaching a picture as a reply from my phone, next post

 

[threnjen]

Here we go

A "before" would have helped, when they were all fine. The diandra reached the surface. Everything was generally full and healthy, rather than scrawny and pathetic.

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[big_al01]

It is called melting! This is normally caused by excess nutrients. They might come back but I'm not for sure! This didn't happen to me when i dirted my tank but i planted very heavily like advised, try that, plant the heck out of the tank! The plants will absorb the excess nutrients and should help with the melting! Also do some 25-50% water changes! Hope this helped!!

 

[Rivercats]

It is not uncommon when moving established plants from one tank into another tank that has different water parameters. The stagnant water probably made matters worse. Melting is not caused by excess nutrients or many hobbyist dosing EI would have a lot of melting plants as that dosing regime is all about providing excess nutrients. I've also found in my dirted tanks that my ph, gh, and kh are often lower than in my non-dirted tanks which again comes down to possibly different water parameters.

Plants usually take off when put in dirted tanks so IMO the dirt was not the problem. How long were you running your lighting for daily? In newly dirted tanks only running lighting 6 hours for the first 4-8 weeks is often helpful in avoiding other problems associated with dirted tanks.

 

[smithpants94]

Lots and lots if water changes! The plants will come back but get those water changes going! Gotta keep those nutrients down!

 

[threnjen]

I've been running the light for 6-8 hours a day. I did do a water change when I got the new Azoo HOB to get rid of as much of the brown scum as possible. I did a 90% water change that time.
I guess I'll do another WC when I get home tonight; that other one was a few days ago. It looks pretty gross in there anyway, you can see the whole bottom is covered with white bacterial clouds. They are stuck all over the plants and substrate.

 

[smithpants94]

When I first dirted my tanks, I did almost 99% water changes everyday for almost a week.. Good luck in the meantime!

 

[threnjen]

Why was that though? Were you filterless, or just trying to reduce the soil nutrients?
The plants were coming from, although inert substrate, a tank dosed with EI and very heavy Excel, so they shouldn't be totally unused to nutrients.

 

[smithpants94]

Yeah, I was just trying to keep nutrients down. I've experimented a little with dirted tanks since then and when I didn't do water changes, I ended up with what you're dealing with.

 

[jetajockey]

Hey Jen. Dirt can be tricky, and initially it can leach a ton of different things which can lead to a host of problems. I definitely agree that when something's amiss just start doing regular water changes and see if it helps. I've had similar issues using potting soils, and frequent water changes seemed to always be the answer. As to what in particular caused the problem, it's anyone's guess without a way to test exactly what's in the water. That's one problem with setups like this, it's a bit less controlled than a standard fert dosing routine.

Re: mineralizing soil- This is a preferred method by me, solely because it involves some rinsing and breaking down/sifting of organics prior to adding to the tank. This seems to make things go much smoother as well

 

[reign]

The sand cap could be the problem if it's fine sand. Sand traps oxygen and creates pockets under it. It's a better idea using gravel as it allows for more oxygen into and out of the dirt.

 

[phishiephishie]

It's normal for plants to melt when moved from different environments. The issue I've seen when people start their first Dirted tank is that they don't have a thick enough cap over the dirt and that causes huge issues with the dirt leaching into the water. After dirting the tank the water should not be brown and dirty looking. If the cap is thick enough the water should be as clear as if there was no dirt in the tank. But Dirted tanks are great and just stick with it, it will pay off when your plants bounce back

 

[Rivercats]

I've been dirting tanks for years, even before it became popular and when using unmineralize soil heavy in organics you will indeed have brown or tea colored water of varying degrees due to tannins leaching from the organics. Different brands of Organic soil leaches to different degrees. The Just Natual Organic Potting Soil I use is a very heavy leaching one. It's also not uncommon to get some small amount of floaties even with a thick enough cap.

 

[phishiephishie]

I've only used miracle grow organic and I've never had any issues with water discoloration but i'm sure it depends on the soil and water change frequency.

 

[threnjen]

I ended up feeling generally dissatisfied with my efforts, so I pretty much broke it down and redesigned it today. I really liked the look of the black sand but it just didn't seem to be working out. I pulled out all the black and and a lot of the dirt, added a bit of fresh dirt, and capped it with small lighter tan gravel. I don't like the look quite as much, but the old plan wasn't working anyway, as the gravel "river" was already dirty with black sand and dirt. Just seemed better to start over for now. I have time anyway as I have been waiting for it to cycle, even after adding a lot of seeded media.
I did have pretty discolored water, I was getting significant leaching. It's ok either way as I expected that as part of a dirt tank.

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[reign]

Could try soaking the dirt fist for a day, I know it kinda gets rid of some of the nutrients but better it in a bucket than in your tank since you'll just get algae from it

 

[reign]

I am going dirt tomorrow, just soaking it for now. See how it works. I want the water to evaporate enough so it's not as wet. Or I'll just drain it with nylon.

 

[threnjen]

I think that should work well. My impatience tends to get the best of me. Soaking the dirt would have been wiser.

 

[sheilak]

dirted tank

ive read that you should soak dirt at least three times letting it dry out between times and sift the soil for sticks and other objects then it would have gotten some of the tannins out and you should have at least a 2 in cap top and sides im planning on a 55 dwarf sunfish tank with native fl sunfish

 

[reign]

Rule of thumb is 1:1 usually 1.5in dirt and 1.5in gravel cap. Not recommended to exeed much more than that.