Replacing Seachem products w/ dry ferts from gregwatson.com

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Kilgore

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Feb 13, 2006
Messages
147
Location
Portland, OR
Hello Everyone,

I have done some reading in this forum on Greg Watson's dry ferts and Tom Barr's EI method, as well as Chuck's calculator, which I have downloaded. I would really like to replace my Seachem products with the dry ferts to save money. I still plan to use Excel and Equilibrium, however. I can also do Seachem's iron if that is easier. But the macros especially are just too expensive at the doses I need. Can someone remind me what the proper ratios should be of nitrate, phosphates, CO2, etc?

Anyhow, I would like to create my own stock solutions, but since I am dealing with 4 planted tanks, it may be better to dose separately. My shopping list is below... anything I need to add, or don't need to bother with?

FYI, I have one 25-gallon with 2.6 wpg compact fluorescent, all others are under 2 wpg normal fluor. Hopefully the 46-gallon will have more light soon (90 watts cf), if I can stop blowing all my money on fertilizers and save for that fixture!

Greg Watson shopping list:

CSM+B Plantex
Potassium Sulfate 1 lb.
Mono Potassium Phosphate 1 lb.
Potassium Nitrate 1 lb.
Magnesium Sulfate 1lb.

Perhaps I don't need the magnesium since I am using Equilibrium? My only concern with the EI method is that I cannot absolutely guarantee that I can do weekly 50% water changes from now until eternity. I would prefer to do less frequent water changes as my tanks age, since I am dealing with four tanks. It takes almost an entire Saturday right now to clean all the tanks, dose ferts, maintain filters, etc. Perhaps I have gotten in over my head.... the lower light tanks shouldn't need as much fertilizing, right?

FWIW, I think it would be an excellent idea to create a sticky that lists a basic fertilizing schedule for one week based on dry ferts, for a well-planted, medium to high light tank. Perhaps this is not practical, since every tank is different, but as a complete newbie, I feel overwhelmed by the complexity of not only figuring out what to dose, but how to mix it, how much to use, and how frequently to use it.

And how not to go broke doing it! :)
 
One thing you can look at is if you have any low light tanks with a decent bioload, you should not have to dose macros except for Potassium, an then your micros. As for phosphate and nitrogen, you shouldn't need to. I'm starting a 3rd planted tank and know how you feel, lol. Takes a bit to do the maintenance, but I do it weekly.

As for the proper ratios, the nitrogen to phosphate should be about 10:1. the CO2 levels oon the tanks where it's needed should be around 25-35ppm.
 
My dosing mixes and schedule (using Greg's fertilizers and assuming a high-light, CO2 supplemented environment):

Nitrate (Dose 10 mL Sat - Mon - Wed - Skip Friday)*
1000 mL Water
7 TBL KNO3 (Potassium Nitrate) = NO3 + .2 ppm/mL or NO3 + 1 ppm/5 mL Dose
= K + .13 ppm/mL or K + .65 ppm/5 mL Dose

Phosphate (Dose 40 mL Sat - 30 mL Mon - Wed - Skip Friday)*
1000 mL Water
4 TSP KH2PO4 (Monopotassium Phosphate) = PO4 + 0.04 ppm/mL or PO4 + 0.2 ppm/5 mL Dose

Potassium (Dose 50 mL Sat, 25 mL Mon - Wed - Skip Friday)*
1000 mL Water
4 TBL + 1 TSP K2SO4 (Potassium Sulfate) = K + .1 ppm/mL or K + .5 ppm/5 mL Dose

Trace Mix*
1000 mL Water (Dose 35 mL Sun - Tues - Thurs)*
2 TBL Plantex CSM + B (Iron and Traces) = Fe + 0.0025 ppm/mL or Fe + 0.05 ppm/20 mL Dose
2 TSP (packed) Iron Chelate (Fe only - Get it from Greg)
2 TSP MgSO4 (Magnesium Sulfate) = Mg + 0.015 ppm/mL or Mg + 0.3 ppm/20 mL Dose

Note that I only dose about 2 ppm of NO3 at a time. This is because my fish load provides most of the NO3 necessary for my plants. In most cases you will want to increase the amount of NO3 you dose by 3-5 times this amount.

*All listed values assume 100 gallons of water in your tank. Express it as a percentage if your tank is smaller.
 
You should feel confident about skipping the magnesium, and if you need more it's easy and cheap enough to pick up MgSO4 as Epsom's Salt. You can narrow down your targets for uptake to limit your water changes under EI -- at its core, the Estimative Index is very adaptable. Lower light tanks do indeed need less fertilization, and all you have to care about under EI is that nothing bottoms out. As a general rule, you should look at KNO3 then traces under low to medium light. I would suggest going with full blown EI in the 2.6wpg CF 25gal, learning how your plants grow and their uptake rates with 50% water changes, then adjusting as you gain experience. It is much easier to work and learn with a tank using established methods than it is to fight algae while tinkering with ideas and theory.
 
my version of EI skips NItrate and phosphate altogether as I have a high fish load and nothing ever comes near to bottoming out.

I dose potassium one day, traces the next and do 50 % water changes once a week.
 
Well, I have a tank that's just a little bigger than yours, a 29G, and here's what I'm doing. I mixed all my solutions, as per travis simonson above. No changes. But for my dosing, here's what I did.

I kept travis simonson's schedule, but made these mods...

1. For my 75G, I multiplied travis' dosing by .75. That's gives me the same ratio as his.
2. for my 29G, I multiplied travis' dosing by .33. That gives me a close ratio as what his is.

Currently I have 2 65W bulbs in my 29G, and one of the bulbs is a 50/50.
Currently I have 390W CF plus 130W actinics running in my 75G

So I'm going to give travis' dosing schedule a shot, to see if I can rid some of this algae problems. Can always adjust the dosing up or down if necessary.
 
Thanks for the info everyone. I placed my order but Mr. Watson is out of town until the 29th, so I probably won't get my order for a week or two. In the meantime I hope the Seachem products will last that long. I will post again after I have been using the dry ferts to report my experiences. Thanks!
 
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