Flourish Excel - Question?

[LindaC]

I just purchased some Flourish Excel to use in my 10 gallon planted tank. I would like to know how often I need to add this to my tank? The bottle says every day or every other day, do I really need to add it this often? It will become awfully expensive if added daily! I received the bottle about 2 days ago and so far have added 1 capful the first day and the second day I added 1 ml.

This 10 gallon tank has 2 - 15 watt screw in compact florescent spirals over it and there's a decent amount of plants in there now, anubias, anarcharis, rotala indica, narrow leaf ludwigia, jave fern and mexican oak leaf. I'm experimenting with a variety of plants to see just what will grow well and what will not. I lot of these plants are cuttings from my 29 gallon planted tank with pressurized co2. I do not wish to go the pressurized route for this tank, I'd like it to be a lot less maintenance. So far, plants seem to be doing very well, not growing much but not fading either.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.
Linda

 

[Skyrmir]

Flourish excel does bad things to Anacharis. Seachem recommends if you have anacharis to only use it every other day rather than daily. Personally I wouldn't use it on Anacharis, it turned mine into little twigs within a few days. Everything else seems to love it though.

 

[Lonewolfblue]

Anacharis won't do to good with it. Also, with the small amount that you would put in a 10G, even daily, a bottle would last quite a long time. I use it in my 26G. and am still on my original bottle. It only gets expensive on larger tanks.

 

[bman]

In my 20 gallon I dose 2ml daily. The original bottle I bought (100ml) lasted a couple of months. Then I bought the big bottle (Cost effective) and just fill up my little one every couple of months.

I would say you should dose no more than 1 ml daily. Or if you plan to keep the anacharis, 1 ml every other day.

 

[crazyred]

With the anacharis in my 29 I dose every two days, the standard dose for my size tank and it's not dead. My anacharis is growing quite well, its just not as busy as when I first got it.

 

[LindaC]

Wow, I'm so glad I asked, I'm suprised about the Anarcharis, it looks so pretty in there too! I'm thinking that maybe I will pull it out and add it to my 29 gallon and find another plant similar to the Anarcharis.

Funny, I also have it in my 29 gallon with pressurized CO2 and the Anarchris in my 10 gallon looks better. The Anarchris in my 29 gallon is in the back directly under the light where you'd think it would grow very well but the tops aren't as green as the rest of the stems, they're beginning to look transparent.

Many thanks all!
Linda

 

[Purrbox]

Sounds like it's suffering from nutrient deficiency in the 29 Gallon. The 29 is probably a bit short on one of the Macros (Nitrate, Phosphate, or Potassium). Fast growing plants like Anacharis will be one of the first to show a deficiency.

 

[malkore]

Because Excel is supplementing carbon in place of a CO2 injection system, it does need to be dosed regularly.
Because Excel is toxic at high doses, you have to add it often in smaller doses (unlike, say, potassium, where you can add a ton and it won't bother fish or plants,a nd will gradually be used up)>

 

[LindaC]

Thanks all, I really appreciate all this help!

 

[7Enigma]

LindaC,

Sounds to me like your 29 gallon is suffering from iron deficiency. Do me a favor: Look in your tank from up above and look at the leaves of the broad leaf species. Do you see the veins outlined darkly against lighter leaves? In my tank I had several plants that slowly (to the point where I almost didn't notice a change) began to lose color and become almost transparent at the tips. My anubias also sprouted a new leaf that was very light green.

When I looked in the tank from the side it looked uniform, but when I looked down from above I could clearly see the veins were much darker than the rest of the leaf. If this is the case get some iron suppliment. My anubias has slowly (past 3 days) started to regain the color starting from the areas closest to the veins, and my java ferns have darkened in color. Most surprising is that the almost transparent tips have begun to take on a healthy green color. This is in 3 days of adding CSM+B which is an iron suppliment as well as trace

The whole time I thought I was suffering from a potassium deficiency (even though I was dosing a good amount of K), but since iron and potassium have similar symptoms it is not always easy to tell.

HTH,

justin