Please help me get to the bottom of this!

[yvonne]

8O 8O

I've posted before, but I think it best to start over. I have only a few live plants in my tank right now - waiting to get my stuff together before planting it fully. I have two issues/questions:

1) I currently have water from my outside tap in the tank. Should I switch to using water from my indoor tap (which runs through a water softner). It is a sodium type tank. I could use Potassium instead.

2) I have black spotty algae on plants/rocks. I have lots of bright green spotty algae on glass. Plants also have some rusty/white large scarred areas and curled leaves. Some of the plants are still growing quite a bit though.

Here are my specs:

65 Gallon; lit with 160 watts (4 40Watt Coralife PlantGrow Tubes about 11 horus a day). Temperature: 78 Filtered through carbon filter.

The water in my tank currently tests at:
PH: 8.4
Ammonia: 0
Nitrate: 5-10 ppm (closer to 5)
Nitrite: 0
GH: 304.30
KH: 232.70
I haven't been able to test for Potassium or Phosphorus yet. All the stores around here keep telling me it is not necessary so they do not stock the tests.
I do not add CO2.

The Hardness of the water in my indoor tap is GH 17.9; KH 232.70. This soft water is not the water I am currently using in my acquarium. Just another option for me.....

Any help would be greatly appreciated! I need to get this under control so I can start having fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[justDIY]

1) I currently have water from my outside tap in the tank. Should I switch to using water from my indoor tap (which runs through a water softner). It is a sodium type tank. I could use Potassium instead.

Hard tap water from the 'outside' tap is fine! Most aquatic plants tolerate hard water quite well. Although swords are supposedly from the amazon (soft black water), they grow very well in my water which is around 16-20 degrees GH (286 to 358 ppm) my KH is lower than yours, around 8 degrees from the tap.

If you want to switch to potassium, make sure your softener supports it. I belive the actual ion-exchange resin (the insides of the softner) work with sodium or potassium, but not interchangeably.

2) I have black spotty algae on plants/rocks. I have lots of bright green spotty algae on glass. Plants also have some rusty/white large scarred areas and curled leaves. Some of the plants are still growing quite a bit though.

holes and scares could be just from damage the plant sustained during transport and planting. if new leaves develop them over time, it is a sign of either metal poisoning or a nutriant defficiency (likely iron).

algae grows in all tanks, regardless of light and what we do to prevent it. The bright green algae that grows on glass is next to impossible to stop, but there are a lot of fish that eat it. my pleco loves the stuff, although it will eventually outgrow the tank it's in. other algae are encouraged by excessive nutriants in the water. usually getting some fast growing plants will help with this. also duckweed although a nuisiance, is great for using up and excess nutriants.

65 Gallon; lit with 160 watts (4 40Watt Coralife PlantGrow Tubes about 11 horus a day). Temperature: 78 Filtered through carbon filter.
GH: 304.30
KH: 232.70

get rid of the carbon, and add some real driftwood to your tank. It will bring your GH down safely. removing the carbon will benefit your plants greatly.

I haven't been able to test for Potassium or Phosphorus yet. All the stores around here keep telling me it is not necessary so they do not stock the tests.

I've never tested for these either. It could be there is no easy test (like for other variables), or like you said, no one buys them so no one sells them!

I do not add CO2.

Adding CO2 will reduce your ph and your kh - these three are all related in a forumla.

I hope this information is helpfull to you - ask away if you have more questions!

 

[yvonne]

Thank you for your input - and I do have more questions....

Hard tap water from the 'outside' tap is fine! Most aquatic plants tolerate hard water quite well. Although swords are supposedly from the amazon (soft black water), they grow very well in my water which is around 16-20 degrees GH (286 to 358 ppm) my KH is lower than yours, around 8 degrees from the tap.

If you want to switch to potassium, make sure your softener supports it. I belive the actual ion-exchange resin (the insides of the softner) work with sodium or potassium, but not interchangeably.

I would actually like to switch over to the indoor tap water (that runs through the water softner) so I can use temperature adjusted water (as opposed to the outdoor tap - especially in the winter). Am I asking for trouble?

holes and scares could be just from damage the plant sustained during transport and planting. if new leaves develop them over time, it is a sign of either metal poisoning or a nutriant defficiency (likely iron).

I do use metal plant weights - is that enough metal to cause a problem? How do I know how much iron to add?

get rid of the carbon,

What do I filter through then? Just the blue padding stuff that I typically sandwich the carbon in?

 

[Guest]

What do I filter through then? Just the blue padding stuff that I typically sandwich the carbon in?

Yes, just a plain filter pad is fine.

I do use metal plant weights - is that enough metal to cause a problem? How do I know how much iron to add?

Those plant weights are designed for aq use, so they shouldnt be causing a problem.

insofar as iron goes, i find my hagen iron test to be pretty useless. I use Leaf Zone, and dose at 1/2 the reccomendation on the bottle. when i did the full reccomended dose, my plant growth was absurdly fast, some plants would grow 2-3 inches a day!

There are alot of good liquid iron supplements available, Leaf Zone is just the first I tried, it works for me, so i never switched.

 

[justDIY]

I would actually like to switch over to the indoor tap water (that runs through the water softner) so I can use temperature adjusted water (as opposed to the outdoor tap - especially in the winter). Am I asking for trouble?

Well, dig around in your basement or crawl space - there must be an indoor tap for your cold water that is before the softener - probably near a drain for flusing the pipes.

If not, and you're feeling ambitious, you can plumb yourself a tap - just put a Tee into your cold water pipe before your water softener, and then attach an inexpesnive valve and hose it.

Using garden hose to fill or drain a tank should be OK, since the toxins that are put into the hose shouldn't have time to leach into fast running water - just let the hose run for a few seconds into your drain before using the water.

I do use metal plant weights - is that enough metal to cause a problem

If they are made of lead, copper or some mystery metal, then yes, that is a problem, for your plants and fish. If they're just little pieces of steel (will show rust), then its not a problem.

How do I know how much iron to add?

leafzone like cc mentioned, or flourish root tabs, or whatever your pet store might have for iron. Like he recommends, start with a small dose and work up, wait a few weeks for signs either good or bad.

What do I filter through then? Just the blue padding stuff that I typically sandwich the carbon in?

I use lava-rocks and white polyfill from JoAnn fabric. Your blue filter padding will work just as well

 

[talenzmeier]

Phosphates

Wow, lots of good info here! I would like to add that your phosphates were/are very high. CO2 will definitely bring them down, but I'd suggest you go one step further and look at whether or not your food has phosphates in it and also consider doing a 25% water change to get ahead on the algae curve.

TL

 

[yvonne]

Re: Phosphates

Wow, lots of good info here! I would like to add that your phosphates were/are very high.
TL

How were you able to tell how high my phosphates are? I didn't test for them cause I couldn't find a test. Is there another way to figure out phosphate numbers based on the numbers I provided? Thanx for the info....