EI journal

[smithrc]

Yeah you better believe it, with these guys you got to have your wits about you, throwing curveballs when you least expect it, keeping me on my toes and ruining my sleep

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Who us

Just keeping you on your toes

 

[nodding_dino]

well, I'm amazed! I got home from work today, and the tank looked as though someone had wound time forward a couple of weeks...the plants seem to have virtually overtaken the whole tank!

It was macro's day, so I tested the water to find:

KNO3 - 3.5 - 4
KH2PO4 - 0.25

The plants seem to have been absolutely eating through the stuff! I had to double check my readings for fear of over dosing the tank! Anyway, a heavy dose has brough the tank back up to target level.

I am going to hold off taking an more photo's until the weekend, but even I have noticed enormous growth despite seeing the tank day in day out.

I have had to (no really, I had to ) order some scissors and tweezers today and am going to have to undertake a MAJOR pruning session over the weekend (more details in the hand holding thread).

I wonder whether the speedy depletion of the macros is in part due to the fast growers in the tank...I may have to take a step back in the not too distant future and replace some of them with plants that aren't quite as zealous!

All the fish seem happy, in fact whilst peering into the tank yesterday, a tiny baby fish nonchalantly swam passed me, before diving back into the jungle! Someone has been upto some rumpy pumpy!

Anyway, I just wanted to bring everyone up to speed with progress!

 

[houndour]

sounds good ND.

My plants are pearling like crazy, but the algae seems to be growing faster this week than last week, but still nowhere as bad as it has been originally. But I still think the improvement is down to CO2.

Last week I took all my riccia out in the hope to scrape off algae, but it didn't work. I ended up just binning the worst affected and putting the rest back in. It's not looking it's best, but it's improved since the weekend...so hopefully by the end of next week it'll all be back to normal.

I'm going to have to do my water change a day early...well 12 hours early really. I'll be doing it saturday night rather than sunday morning. I hope this won't mess things up. But sunday is fully booked.

Other than that I think it's too early to see if the EI has made a difference.

 

[smithrc]

me again folks... - the tank is doing great. I finally got 10 mins last night (at about 2am) to make up my mixes

500ml KN03 - 1ppm/ml
250ml KH2PO4 - 0.03ppm/ml

I've just had another spare 10 mins and have tested my tank water.

It dosnt look like I need to be dosing at all

My PO4 is at 5ppm and my NO3 is at about 20ppm

This is not after a water change. its been about 3 weeks without a change as i didnt want to disturb the plants.

Shall I leave it and test again during the week to see if these figures have gone up or down?

 

[zig]

Ok guys just a little update i had a conversation with iggy01 today in one of the threads on this board today and being the clued in individual that he is he decided to import some CSM+B Plantex, basically this is another dry fertiliser which would provide your trace elements or micro nutrients and free you from the shackles of your lfs for buying liquid fertiliser, Kent botanic etc.

I had considered this before but thought it would be too expensive an option as the fertiliser is imported from America, and i had figured the postage would be really expensive, so i never pursued it.

Anyway iggy01 imported 1 lb of plantex includeing postage for approx £16, hardly a fortune and a lot less than i had figured previously.

This because of its affordability should be seriously considered by those of us here pursueing this method simply based on the economic advantages, and off course because the plantex is also excellent as a source of trace elements and is probably the most widely used source of trace elements by serious hobbyists worldwide, also it is not available widely in the UK, it was only today for the first time that i came across a site selling the same dry mix in the UK, but basically it was a rip off and would have cost £65 + postage for the same amount that iggy01 imported for £16, but i have not seen it available anywhere else, perhaps in time it will be more widely available at a reasonable price but not at the moment.

Anyway it makes sense if you run the maths on it, this is the good bit...........

These are based on my rough calculations(worst case is even allowing for a 20% discrepency on my behalf, ill try and pin the figures down further but i think these are correct)

You would be importing 1 lb which would be 453 grams (less than half a bag of sugar in weight) you mix up i level tablespoon or 16.8 grams of plantex with 250ml of RO water, and you would dose 5ml 3x per week for every 20 gallons of water.

So in my case i have a 40 gallon i would dose 30ml per week and the 250ml would last me approx 2 months or 8 weeks.

So divide 16.8 grams into 453 grams = approx 30, so i would be able to make up 30 x 250ml solutions and this should last me about 250 weeks or nearly 5 years now thats if i have the figures correct which im pretty sure i do, but maybe iggy01 can run the rule over my calculations and make sure they are correct, so you can see from the above that you would save an absolute fortune by not having to buy regular fertiliser, and the news gets even better in that the regular mix (CSM+B) contains iron as well, or if you find you have to dose a lot of iron another mix is available CSM+B Plus Extra Iron, so it may eliminate the need to dose that as well and save even more money.

It is available from gregwatson.com or HERE

Anyway thats all for now, ill be placeing my order in the next day or so maybe you guys should think about it as well.

And hats off to iggy01 for pointing it out to me in the first place as to how cheap it was, but it was only when i ran the rule over it that i realised how much i would save by ordering it and like i say most serious hobbyists use it anyway so i wouldnt have any issues as regards the quality of the product either.

Myself and igg01 will accept commission for provideing the above information major credit cards and paypal are all good we will not accept any responsibility for any algae issues that may occur these are the users own responsibility


Edit:Gremlins in the post i dont know what the guy with the shades in the smilie is doing there because i didnt put him there, i tried to get rid of him in an edit and hes appeared again, ow well he will have to stay there, it should read csm+b.

 

[zig]

me again folks... - the tank is doing great. I finally got 10 mins last night (at about 2am) to make up my mixes

500ml KN03 - 1ppm/ml
250ml KH2PO4 - 0.03ppm/ml

I've just had another spare 10 mins and have tested my tank water.

It dosnt look like I need to be dosing at all 

My PO4 is at 5ppm and my NO3 is at about 20ppm

This is not after a water change. its been about 3 weeks without a change as i didnt want to disturb the plants.

Shall I leave it and test again during the week to see if these figures have gone up or down?

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Now it would be funny if you didnt have to dose at all after the hassle of getting the chemicals

One thing i dont understand is why your PO4 is at 5ppm, i thought your tapwater was only 2-3ppm, if anything the PO4 reading should be going down and not up as the plants should be useing up the PO4, it depends on the tank but you should be useing up some PO4, i use up about 1 to 1.5 ppm per week.

But this is really the reason for the water changes to reset your tank, so no levels will get to high, you may find 3 weeks is to long for doing water changes and you may have to do them sooner.

I would do a min 50% water change this weekend and check the levels again, but you may get away with these sort of levels only time will tell, but it isnt really recommended by the the guy who came up with this method to rely 100% on organic NO3 and PO4, in other words fish and food waste, he recommends that they should be topped up with the bought chemical fertilisers if the levels allow, thats if you want to go for optimum health and growth levels for the plants.

His reasoning for this is that the NO3 in particular should be available to the plants witout having to go through the NH4 stage, fish do not produce NO3 straight away they produce NH4 first of all and through the nitrifying process it turns into NO3.

There are other reasons also but i dont know your fishload or how much you feed them, but like i say you might get away with these levels over time some people do.

Your NO3 levels are ok anything up to 30ppm is good, the PO4 levels are a bit high but some people get away with these levels and the most important thing is PO4 does not induce algae unless the levels are to low.

But you have the choice of doing more regular water changes to reset the tank, its really up to you, or you could go a few weeks between and see if any problems occur, but i would personally not let the level of PO4 get any higher then it is now without doing a water change.

Or just as a thought you could add more plants and see if the levels reduce over time.

 

[smithrc]

just off to do a water change... I've sat and tried to think when i didn the last change... its a lot longer than 3 weeks ago.... for all i know the PO4 could have built up a LOT and the plants are clearing it up nicely over the last 2 weeks...

just had a look back through some posts... we haven done a water change in there for at least 4 weeks...

 

[houndour]

the guy with the shades is made from 8) 8 ) and B) B )

sounds good zig... still £18 I might use up my Kent grow first. A bottle of that cost about a tenner so after its used up the £18 is well worth the money.

 

[zig]

the guy with the shades is made from 8) 8 ) and B) B )

sounds good zig... still £18 I might use up my Kent grow first. A bottle of that cost about a tenner so after its used up the £18 is well worth the money.

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I did the figures again and apperantly what you need to mix is only 12 grams per 250 water soloution, so even better still, what you guys should do is just order one lot or 1 lb and split it between you and then it would cost practically nothing between you, less than the cost of 1 bottle of Kent grow, and it would still last you at least a couple of years, anyway just a thought.

You only mix up small amounts at a time and you store the unused powder in a dark dry place, also when you make up the solution most people keep it in the fridge and it keeps better, if you dont fridge it sometimes a sort of slime will appear at the surface of the solution.

Im definatly going to order it anyway and give it a go, i dont think i can go wrong for £16 and it means i wouldnt have to buy practically any other pre made liquid fertiliser.

 

[nodding_dino]

what you guys should do is just order one lot or 1 lb and split it between you and then it would cost practically nothing between you

I thought exactly the same thing! We could probably go two or even three ways...!

 

[houndour]

You only mix up small amounts at a time and you store the unused powder in a dark dry place, also when you make up the solution most people keep it in the fridge and it keeps better, if you dont fridge it sometimes a sort of slime will appear at the surface of the solution.

Im definatly going to order it anyway and give it a go, i dont think i can go wrong for £16 and it means i wouldnt have to buy practically any other pre made liquid fertiliser.

Should we be keeping the K2HPO4 and KNO3 solutions in the fridge? or just the micro solution?

I'm up for splitting some powder, if anyone else wants to share the cost?

 

[zig]

You only mix up small amounts at a time and you store the unused powder in a dark dry place, also when you make up the solution most people keep it in the fridge and it keeps better, if you dont fridge it sometimes a sort of slime will appear at the surface of the solution.

Im definatly going to order it anyway and give it a go, i dont think i can go wrong for £16 and it means i wouldnt have to buy practically any other pre made liquid fertiliser.

Should we be keeping the K2HPO4 and KNO3 solutions in the fridge? or just the micro solution?

I'm up for splitting some powder, if anyone else wants to share the cost?

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No just the micro Sam, whatever is in it can make it go slimy after a while.

 

[houndour]

OK, I've been doing the EI for nearly 2 weeks...I know it's not enough but I've noted a difference between week 1 and week 2.

The algae returned slower in week 1, as a rough measurement I've been using the algae on the glass as a guideline. Week 1 and the algae on the glass didnt even need cleaning off (well it did but could of got away with not doing it).

Week 2, the algae was in a bad state by Thursday. By Sunday I could barely see the fish

CO2 has been about the same, ranging from 20 to 25 ppm. The plants have been pearling loads (or maybe its the algae thats pearling ) both weeks every day.

Week 1 I gradually took the nitrates up to 10ppm.
Week 2 I instantly got nitrates up to 10ppm. They seemed to stay there abouts and I only had to top up at the end of the week.

Week 1 I think off the top of my head I ended up with 2ppm phosphates by the end of the week.
Week 2 I kept it at about 1ppm.

I'm not sure what to do to help combat the algae.

//edit

I have this months copy of PFK and I'm a bit disappointed by its plant advice. It has a section on algae and suggests that nitrates and phosphates should be kept as close to zero as poss and that algae is often a cause of poor maintenance, over stocking and or over feeding.

I feed my fish once every other day, I dont think I'm over stocked, and I do a 50% water change once a week.

 

[zig]

OK, I've been doing the EI for nearly 2 weeks...I know it's not enough but I've noted a difference between week 1 and week 2.

The algae returned slower in week 1, as a rough measurement I've been using the algae on the glass as a guideline.  Week 1 and the algae on the glass didnt even need cleaning off (well it did but could of got away with not doing it).

Week 2, the algae was in a bad state by Thursday.  By Sunday I could barely see the fish

CO2 has been about the same, ranging from 20 to 25 ppm.  The plants have been pearling loads (or maybe its the algae thats pearling ) both weeks every day.

Week 1 I gradually took the nitrates up to 10ppm.
Week 2 I instantly got nitrates up to 10ppm.  They seemed to stay there abouts and I only had to top up at the end of the week.

Week 1 I think off the top of my head I ended up with 2ppm phosphates by the end of the week.
Week 2 I kept it at about 1ppm.

I'm not sure what to do to help combat the algae.

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Hi Sam

Sam im going to sound like a nagging nanny here but knowing that your nutrient levels are in good shape there can only be one other explanation, 99% of the time when algae occurs and nutrient levels are in good shape it is because of your co2 levels, you need to keep the co2 at 30ppm minimum, 20ppm is to low IMO, i know in the Barr report he states levels between 20-30ppm are ok, but he is presumeing that this is a constant stable rate probably maintained with pressurised co2, with diy co2 maintaining stability or a constant rate is much harder.

I usually aim for for 30ppm on the lowside, and i maintain my diy co2 somewhere between 30-40ppm, this leaves me room for error if it starts hitting the lowside of 30ppm, but even at 30ppm i dont fear getting algae if my nutrient levels are in check, it doesnt have any ill effects on my fish and ive been doing this for months with no losses.

So i think if you can try and up the levels of co2 to 30ppm and keep them there you will see a difference.

So sorry to be pain but its probably the co2 levels.

Id try and remove as much of the algae as you can by hand, your probably doing this allready, i found a that an old toothbrush was good for this when i had some hair algae in the beginning (before i started EI )

You might have to think about a pressurised co2 system if you keep getting problems with the co2, about £110 would buy you a nice system, just something to think about and maybe something to aim for in the future, because i know you hate the diy method.

Edit: interesting about PFK, the guy who wrote the article must be a bit of an expert at this stage at combatting algae, because thats all hes going to get with 0 nitrates and phosphates

 

[houndour]

You might have to think about a pressurised co2 system if you keep getting problems with the co2, about £110 would buy you a nice system, just something to think about and maybe something to aim for in the future, because i know you hate the diy method.

I do hate changing the CO2. I've got 2 on my 20 gallon, and Ive been changing them alternately every 4 days. I dont know why I'm struggling to get a high enough level...

I promise to work harder on attaining 30ppm