ok... can someone plese tell me how to do the dosing thing!

[greenmaji]

Maybe a little more detail about your CO2 setup?
I would agree with czcz with the powered reactor, the performance is exellent with some designs.

NO3 and PO4 are kindof tied together, I wouldn't does one and not the other unless you have plenty of PO4 in your tapwater or something; what are your PO4 tests like? Are you testing PO4? If not please start

CO2 levels??
PH and KH?

Am I trying to get to the root of this

 

[MarkP]

First off, EI and PMDD are to entirely separate dosing philosophies. The reason that you can get away with mixing all of your ferts into a single solution with PMDD is that one of the premises involves limiting Phophates. When Phophates and Iron are mixed together the Iron will precipitate out of the solution making it unavailable to your plants. Since PMDD limit Phosphates this minimizes the problem.

This is less of an issue in an aquarium as long as the ferts are dosed at least 4 hours apart. Not entirely sure of the science behind it, people are still working figuring it all out. Most people find it easier to simply alternate dosing of Phophates and Iron on separate days.

One of the most basic principles of EI is making sure that all the necessary nutrients are available in ample supply at all times. This means that nothing is limited, including Phosphates. If you mixed everything into a single solution you would end up accidently limiting iron. This leads to yellow leaves with green veins.

Hope this helps clear things up.

BINGO! You just answered a BIG part of my question. Namely, that if mixing it all together causes the iron to fall out of the solution, then why does PMDD work? Because the part that makes it fall out of solution may very well be the Phosphate, not the Potassium Nitrate.

If I may explain the PMDD on EI schedule thing- I made a really big bottle of PMDD, planning on dosing that plus extras of whatever I was deficent in. Expense of all the additional tests plus the inaccurancy of my iron test lead me to EI. My PMDD bottle was adapted to use EI dosing schedule- So I have one bottle with Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Sulfate, etc, much like I described early. The only thing I currently dose seperately is Phosphate, and that only because I dose it from the fleet bottle, and didn't want to have to recalcute my mL to PPM ratio for the other ferts by adding Fleet to it.

Hmmm... if you should add Phosphates at least 4 hours from when you add the rest... Why doesn't the EI article mention that? Or does it, maybe I skimmed a paragraph I shouldn't have.

I'd still love to know the chemical process- Maybe I can try to track it down tomorrow.

 

[czcz]

The PMDD pre-mix on gregwatson.com does not have PO4. I believe the percipitate is either ferric (Iron +3) phosphate -- FePO4 -- or ferrous (Iron +2) phosphate -- Fe3(PO4)2.

It is very possible to use a PMDD-like mix for EI. In the end it's nothing bottoming out that you care about, and so you can combine the other macros (N, K) with traces to hit your targets and make life easier if you want, assuming you've already mastered dosing for your tank.

Again, people with large tanks dose P and Fe together without issue. Under any modern (not PMDD) dosing schedule there's always P available anyway. The percipitate is easily seen when mixing them together in concentrtated solution, and best practice is to dose them on opposite days simply because most aquarists are so concerned about available Fe falling out of solution. Even ignoring P, many of us dose Fe several times a week to ensure its always available to plants, for example.

(As I understand, available Fe also falls out of solution when exposed to light and falls out faster as KH rises. This is why it is recommended one keep their trace mix in an opaque bottle and why we often see long-term white clouding when dosing CSM+B in moderate and high KH water.)

 

[mr funktastic]

alright i am back! i was happy to see all the response that i got. the post seems to have got a little complicated for me but it also seems to have helped alot of people which is good. i think i am going to go the sechum root for now and will move up to gregs dry stuff later. i am going to make a dosing schedule sto see what i will be needing so i dont get caught up in it. i have had it running on 60 watts for a week or so now and the tank seems to be doing fine but i can see a potassium deficiency problem and my nitrates are hovering dangerously low. greenmaji - my co2 system is just simply 2 2 litre juice containers fed into T splitter and then run to my hagen ladder then all escaping bubbles get sucked up into my aqua clear. simple but effective. i am dont have a phosphate or KH test kit right now but i was planning on getting one soon lol. i will also be upgrading to pressurized co2 as soon as i can get the bottle filled. i have been having a hard time since the threads are a little different. i found a place that will do it but i need to get there. Glenc i will be messaging u tonight about that fert u offered and maybe some cuba aswell i would love to take a look at your dosing schedule for your 20 if u dont mind, would make life alot easier. thanks for all the am,azing help so far guys. keep it coming.

 

[greenmaji]

Testkits will definatly help you figure out wich direction to go.
This all could be something simple as NO3O4 ratio being off or CO2 levels too low, but without testkits your flying a little blind.

 

[czcz]

It is a lot of info but execution isn't as hard as it reads, mr funktastic. You can start with EI and work out the details later if you're into specifics, target levels, and the chemistry. I strongly suggest you avoid the dependency on the root tabs with such higher light. Just do it right : the ~$25 or whatever you'll spend on GregWatson.com will last you forever and a day.

+/- 1/8 tsp KNO3 (N) 3x a week
+/- 1/32 tsp KH2PO4 (P) 3x a week
+/- 1/32 tsp K2SO4 (K) 3x a week
+/- 1/32 tsp Trace Elements 3x a week
50% weekly water change

Personally I would double the KNO3 dose, or at the least use rounded/heaping 1/8tsp doses. If you prefer to not dose dry, mix the weekly dose into a solution as MarkP suggested. Just make two or more solutions so you don't mix the traces with KH2PO4. Or skip the CSM+B, mix the rest into one solution, and dose it every other day. Then dose regular Flourish on the skipped days.

 

[mr funktastic]

so if i mixed thses into water how much water should i be using? would i be mixing 3x 1/8 tsp KNO3 (N), 3x +/- 1/32 tsp KH2PO4 (P) and 3x +/- 1/32 tsp K2SO4 (K) into 1 bottle, or more so it last more than a week? i dont mind dry dosing but are there any benifits to mixing it in water? i dose floursih trace right now, is that what u meant by regualr flourish? i dose 1 cap 2 times a week... is this enough? thats how much it says on the bottle so thats all i do.

 

[czcz]

so if i mixed thses into water how much water should i be using?

If you only make a solution for the current week, it doesn't matter. If you dose a third of the mix, you're dosing a third of whatever you put into the mix. Make sense?

would i be mixing 3x 1/8 tsp KNO3 (N), 3x +/- 1/32 tsp KH2PO4 (P) and 3x +/- 1/32 tsp K2SO4 (K) into 1 bottle

Yes, then dosing a third of that bottle three times a week.

, or more so it last more than a week?

Only if you want to. This is making a dosing solution, in which case you do care about the amount of water you're diluting with. In this case, you'd use something like Chuck's calc to calculate your formulas. For example, lets say you have an empty 500mL bottle of Seachem around. You could add 8TBL of KNO3, so dosing 5mL (one bottle cap) is about the same as dosing 1/4tsp of KNO3 dry. (Assuming you want to dose NO3 a little rich per the suggestion above.)

i dont mind dry dosing but are there any benifits to mixing it in water?

If you mix the dry dose in a cup of water first, there's no difference. Fish may eat the ferts if you dose dry directly into the tank.

Dosing dry is just easier for most.

i dose floursih trace right now, is that what u meant by regualr flourish? i dose 1 cap 2 times a week... is this enough?

*edit: no, the regular Seachem Flourish: http://seachem.org/products/product_pages/Flourish.html Flourish Trace does not have the essential micronutrients (Fe, for example) and is not an adequate trace mix for high light.

HTH buddy

 

[mr funktastic]

alright that makes alot of sense. i just checked out gregs site aswell as chucks to see what i am doing. once i get some spare cash i will place an order at gregs for potassium, nitrate, phosphorus and maybe the csm+b. how long will the mixtures last if i mix them into water. i would rather mix 1 more concentrated batch of each then do weekly batches. can it go bad? thanks for making it simply czcz

 

[czcz]

With KNO3, KH2PO4 and K2SO4 it shouldn't matter how long they are in solution. Making your own mixture is essentially the same as any commercial product.

With CSM+B, you should plan to make a new mix every month or so, otherwise the mix starts turning funny colors and some experience molding. You can extend this time by keeping the container in a cool and dark place.

 

[mr funktastic]

alright that sounds good. i think i will skip the csm+b untill my flourish trace runs out. is csm+b better than flourish? it is wayyy cheaper but is is wayy better? how does the flourish not go bad? czcz you are awesome!! thanks for answering all my questions so fast.

 

[Purrbox]

Tropica Master Grow, Flourish, and CSM+B are all highly recommended and would be good options. Some have reported better sucess when using a specific one of the three, but I think it heavily depends on a combination of elements including your source water and the types of plants that you are growing.

 

[mr funktastic]

thanks purrbox. i have always seen the tropica mastergrow and wondered wether it was any good. i think i might order the csm+b and use it for 2 week and then switch to flourish for 2 weeks to see if there is a difference. my natural tap water is pretty hard but i dont know if that makes a big difference. would using all gregs ferts be more comatible then using all but the trace flourish? would haveing one different brand really make a difference? i just set up a 5 gallon that i want to plant so maybe i will experiment my dosing in this tank before i add fish so i can screwup and it wont matter.

 

[Purrbox]

Using Flourish with the other product will work just fine. Just to clarify that you want to be using Flourish Comprehensive and not Flourish Trace. The Flourish Trace doesn't have everything that the Flourish Comprehensive does and would not be recommended.

You might want to make your comparison trials a bit longer. I've seen a lot of recommendations for at least 3 weeks at a particular dosing schedule before making changes.

 

[czcz]

Looking at traces real deep is pretty much the thing you do when you have othing else left to play with fwiw For example, The Barr Report has been focussing on the little discussed traces for the past few newsletters. Brand preference is just a preference: its all pretty much the same.

The big selling point of something like Flourish or TMG is their chelator quality, which ensures that elements (say, Fe) stay in their available state for plant consumption. This also increases efficiency, so theoretically you shouldn't have to dose as often or as much. For example, TMG's directions state it only has to be dosed once a week, and TMG's recommendation doses much much less Fe than most hobbyists.

For what its worth, I switched from CSM+B+Extra Fe (Greg's old/discontinued "experimental mix") to TMG, then to dosing both of them together. If you dose every other day I don't think chelation quality matters so much, and personally my tanks run better with rich traces, and TMG is too expensive to dose richly alone. (You could say I supplement CSM+B+Extra Fe. I'm also cheap.) This is all nitpicking imo but I have some comparison pics if you want.

My suggestion is to pick whichever one (Flourish, TMG, CSM+B) is more appealing to you. There is no compatibility issues with your other ferts.

how does the flourish not go bad?

Dunno, but Seachem reps seem to be real prompt and informative with questions. Maybe they have an anti-molding agent or something in there. Maybe its something with the bottle. Maybe some bottles do get mold eventually.

Following Seachem's percentages of solution, it really is true that Flourish Trace is glorified tap water btw.

edit: typing while Purrbox posted.

 

[Purrbox]

Actually they do recommend that you keep Flourish Comprehensive refrigerated as well. You don't have too and it won't go bad if you don't, it just keep funky stuff from developing that doesn't look good. They had a post about it someplace awhile back with all the specifics. They were thinking of removing the recommendation to refrigerate as it caused to many questions for the likelyhood of anything growing in the mix. Not sure if this is similar to what developes in CSM+B after it's been around for awhile or not.

 

[czcz]

Great pics and plants in your Aquascaping thread. 'Case you're ready to tweak dosing, I think the red Myriophyllum dropping older leaves points towards NO3 and/or PO4 deficiency. I think you can bring that plant back easily after dosing. HTH