Soaking flourite

[DirtyTankMan]

Would there be any benefit in soaking new fluorite in enough water to cover it mixed with a high concentration of fertilizer? Would it absorb anything? And if so would it all release as soon as you flooded the tank?

 

[CorallineAlgae]

It's an interesting idea. I would simply recommend sprinkling the bare tank bottom with osmocote plus, rinsing the Flourite like crazy and adding it right on top of the osmocote. That's standard practice.

Your idea may have merit but I would think that mixing the bottom half of the Flourite with ferts and capping it with plain Flourite might be safer.

 

[aqua_chem]

I don't think it would absorb anything that it wouldn't normally absorb in a matter of hours-days. If you did see any benefit, it would be very short lived.

 

[CorallineAlgae]

Powdered and liquid ferts are used in planted aquariums as a way to get nutrients into the water column quickly. In other words they're very water soluble. Longer term substrate enrichment is always successfully achieved by using timed released fertilizers like root tabs.

But, if the goal is to help a new tank quickly establish the plants using a dry/damp start you should see a benefit. I don't see how mixing it could help much more than simply putting the ferts on the tank bottom and going from there. If you try it let us know how you fair.