Plants, fertilizers and how often?

[bman]

I would like to see:

the size of your tank and light
the plants you have
the inches of fish you have
The chemicals you use
the dosages
and the frequency you dose

I am trying to figure out the science of chemical additions, and have not a clue if I am doing things correctly.

20 gallon 2.5WPG
Wisteria and dwarf sag
7 inches if fish
Seachem
Excel 3ml twice a week - 8 on Weekly WC
Nitrogen 2ml twice a week - 3 on weekly WC
Iron 2ml once a week - 2ml on weekly WC
Potassium 3ml twice a week - 3 on weekly WC

 

[ringfinger]

I will tell you about the one that is actually working...

20g long w/ 3.25 WPG of PC 10000/6700
DIY Co2 using 1 2-liter bottle and a Vortex diffuser
Red Tiger Lotus and Glosso
20" of fish plus several Amano Shrimp
I dose using Travis' schedule: http://www.aquariumadvice.com/viewtopic.php?p=411374&highlight=#411374
And I use the dry fertz from gregwatson.com which I would highly recommend!

This 20 gallon tank is doing great. No fish deaths, and the gloss is growing in nicely. I am doing the SAME DARN THING in my 29 gallon, but have nothing but green water to show from it. BTW, the tank has been running for about 3 months now.

 

[TankGirl]

This is a great question, and a lot of good information can be obtained from the answers you get, bman.

However, keep in mind that there are variables other than plants, light, fish, ferts and maintenance routines. You put a 20gal in my house with all the same things as a 20 gal in someone else's house across town and you are likely to get different results over time (this would be a great study for a couple of aquarists to perform who live in different areas, btw). There are differences in the quality and makeup of source/water change water and dissolved organics in the tank that will make a difference, as evidenced by the two tanks ringfinger mentions. Even altitude could be a factor.

The best way to know whether you are doing things correctly is whether or not your plants and fish are healthy. If you do not have excessive algae, your fish are happy and your plants are thriving, robust and require pruning, then no matter what you are doing, you are doing it right! Let the plants and fish be your guide. Plants are usually pretty good at giving clues to what is missing based on their symptoms.

It is good to know what others do who have success, though, and I'll provide some of my particulars:

55gal, 4.7wpg.

A list as long as my arm of plants ranging from low light to high light-requiring species.

I don't know the inches of fish, but the tank is a moderately (or a bit more than that) stocked.

Pressurized CO2 in the 30-35ppm range

Weekly 50% PWC, with 15mL TMG, dry potassium, double-dose of Excel and about 5mL of iron. Daily 5mL TMG and otherwise dry KNO3 is dosed to maintain about 15ppm, as needed. Tap water is moderately hard and alkaline, with a hefty dose of PO4 built right in.

My other tanks with 2wpg basically get weekly 50% PWC with a shot of iron, daily Excel and rarely need a bit of KNO3 dosed to bring that up to 15ppm. High light bowl gets every 2-3 days 50% PWC and a couple of drops of Excel daily.

Low light tank gets weekly 50% PWC and that is all.

 

[bman]

Tankgirl -

Dosing excel everyday? How much? Since I do not supplement with CO2, I may have to step up my excel as well. I have been thinking about that for a little while now. Plus I am strongly thinking about adding root tabs, as my wisteria and dwarf sags (from research on plantgeek) say that they like nutrient rich substrate, of which I have just standard gravel.

I do strongly agree that there are multiple variables that will differ across the board, but what i am looking for is just the frequency and amounts, in general. I mean, everybody talks about dosing schedules, but that can be quite varied as seen here with just two replies.

Anyway I hope everyone can contribute. This will make quite an interesting generality.

Thanks to all
Bryan

 

[TankGirl]

The wisteria is not so needy in terms of nutrients for their roots, but the sags will likely benefit.

I definitely dose Excel every day in my smaller tanks of 2wpg or over.

I am interested to see the other replies.

 

[bman]

I wonder if people are not posting due to the fact I totally messed up the thread name.

"Frestilizers" If only I could edit that!

Sad, but only two replies? I'm not asking for the world.

I don't care if your fertilizer dosage is " a glug of this, two glugs of that"!
That's what the LFS guy told me about his display 55 gallon planted tank.

 

[malkore]

The reason I chose not to post, is because what works for my tanks may or may not work for your tanks.

Your best bet at 'easy dosing info' is to google for Tom Barr's Estimative Index. It's a straight forward approach to dosign that's neither too scientific nor too dumbed down.

 

[Simpte]

Couldn't have said it better myself. I use the E.I. method myself in my 75 gallon. It has very few fish in it right now. 12 otos, 3 rosey barbs (had a thread algae problem), and 2 leftover guppies that somehow survived and grew from another tank I tore down). I dose KNO3 and KH2PO4 every other day and trace/micros on opposite days. Sundays are waterchange days on the larger tanks. I keep a 30 gallon rubbermaid container with R.O. water (Tap here is liquid rock) that has set at least 2 days to get to room temp. I use 5 parts R.O. to 1 part tap. This gives me the ca and mg I need. I also use baking soda as my tap has a lot of non bicarb alkilinity. This post and dosing schedule will not help you as very few have my kind of water nor try to keep a percise ph. I have pressurezed CO2 also.

My lighitng over the 75 is 4x65 PC.

 

[czcz]

8g submersed + 10g emersed (~10g water total) high light, reverse photoperiods
Pogostemon, Ludwigia, Polygonum, Hydrocotyle, Elatine, Crypt, Vesicularia, Juncus, etc species
~25inches of fish (4 kuhlii loaches, 3 otocinclus, 4 rasbora, 2 blue-eyed rainbow fish)
Adapted EI:
>40ppm DIY CO2
10ppm N from KNO3 MWF
1.5ppm P from KH2PO4 MWF
>20ppm K from KCl Su
.3ppm Fe from CSM+B+Extra Fe TThS
1mL Excel TThS (I mix in a solution with CSM+B+Extra Fe)
>50% pwc Su
Algae: green spot

10g high light
Tonina, Eriocaulon, Rotala, Pogostemon, Ammania, Ludwigia, and Hottonia sp.
no fish
EI + ADA substrate system:
>40ppm DIY CO2
5ppm NO3 from KNO3 MF
.5ppm PO4 from KH2PO4 MF
>20ppm K from KCl
.3ppm Fe and 1mL Excel from mix above TThS
~75% pwc Su
Algae: greenwater (my fault from experiment), green spot

10g medium light+ambient sunlight
Vesicularia, Crypt, Hygrophillia, Mayaca, Nymphaea, Azolla, Isoetes sp
~12" of fish
~20ppm DIY CO2
>20ppm K from KCl Su
~50% pwc every other week
Algae: slight greenwater
(was Walstad-ish tank)

20 long low light
Anubias, Marimo balls, Anacharis
~20" of fish (Ryukin goldfish, 7 white clouds)
No dosing, ~30pwc Su
No algae

HTH

 

[bman]

First, thank you to whomever corrected my thread's title.

Second, I know that all the parameters I am asking for will be different for ever single person and every tank out there.

What my interest lies is in the commonalities that will/may occur. Weekly routines, chemicals used, CO2 user differences (if any relation to fertilization regimes), bioload in fish inches compared to gallons compared to tank size compared to plants involved compared to lighting, and finally how insanely meticulous are some of you as I.

Maybe I am hoping for too much here, but my hopes are that I just get a lot of responses. Maybe there will be some general statement I can make from this information that will help me (at least) feel like I'm on the right track, maybe not.

Maybe someone else will see the information and say, HEY! I do the same thing! Bizarre, but you never know!

I unfortunately don't know (as the novice thing under my name suggests). I don't know anything about what I'm doing, but I will research every aspect of this hobby until my wife yells at me again for being obsessed about " a stupid fish tank".

Oh yeah, and I did read the EI thing someone referred me too. Well, I glanced through most of it. Man, that is long and dry. I do agree with it, by the way(from what i've read)

Sorry for the rant.

 

[czcz]

What my interest lies is in the commonalities that will/may occur.

From your questions it appears you realize that no matter the method, the targets for NPK, Fe/Trace, and CO2 are essentially the same, assuming light level is the same. In the end, all we are doing is adopting some schedule to maintain some adaptation of the levels summarized in Malkore's sticky (and EI and so on). You are on the right track, but to this member listing a dosing schedule implies you are testing and dosing to maintain those targets. If you are doing something different, let us know and we may be able to help.

Good thread btw. I too am interested in other's schedules.

 

[Zezmo]

I recently started using the Estimative Index (EI) after reading Tom Barr's report on it (found on his web site). I then made a spread sheet to help me with the schedule and to figure out concentrations and such.
It is set up based on adding teaspoons of ferts to my 55 gallon tank. There is however an "adjustment" built in to use it for any size of tank.


http://webpages.charter.net/zezmo/FertDoseRoutine.xls