New Pinned Article - EI from zig

[George Farmer]

Post your feedback/questions here. I'm sure you will all agree that zig deserves a big "thank you". http/www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=104737

 

[nodding_dino]

the original got locked as I was passing on my congratulations

Zig, thats a great article...nice and concise, easy to read and understand...it's EI in a nutshell! Your going to help out a lot of people with this one, it's quite a daunting subject to get your head around at first, and this is a great way of providing all the detail in a easily digestible way!

kudos Zig!

(PS - links need looking at )

 

[OIJ]

Great, very detailed summary! Saves me plenty of reading

Thanks Zig.

 

[xxSarahxx]

Oh....i shall post it on here instead then!!
That is so useful. Thanks so much guys. Detailed but easy to make sense of!
Wonderful!!

 

[George Farmer]

Sorry, I had to post it here before I could pin it. You both managed to reply in the short time it took me to edit the links.

 

[Vivienne]

That was good timing - I've upped the lighting, started adding the CO2 and was just wondering what I needed to learn next ! Too much to digest in one go though, so I've printed it off to read at my leisure. Excellent.

 

[iggy01]

Well done Zig!

Hopefully your piece on EI will save many people, especially those just starting in the hobby, a great deal of wasted time and effort, trying to get rid of algae.

They'll be able to sit and admire their tanks instead.

 

[paulioo]

yeah well done Zig !

Perfect timing for me too. Explained it all making it very easy to follow.

Paul.

 

[@ombomb]

My word!

I've been planning on making the switch to EI when I get back from holiday and now I have some reading material to keep me going while I'm away!

Thanks zig!

 

[zig]

Thanks guys.........im.......eh........lost for words

I suppose its to late to be entered for the Booker prize

 

[qwikimpss]

ZIG! Awesome article! It has been printed out and put in my folder of aquarium information for easy reference. Will help everyone tons!

 

[jimbooo]

nice one zig, printing off some bedtime reading as we speak.

i'm in desperate need of this now as the damn hair algae's getting a bit out of control. )

 

[paulioo]

Ok today was my first day using the EI method as i got my dry fertiliser through the post this morning

There's only one thing thats confusing me and thats regarding nitrates.

My nitrates from my tap water are zero, and my tank has between 0 and <5 ppm even after 1 week. So when i go about my weekly water changes do i simply add 1-2 ppm of nitrate everyday.

If this is the case wont my nitrates only really reach 10-30 ppm just before im due to do a water change? And so resetting it all back to zero. So my plants will only get at most, 1 full day of the recomended nitrates.

Help please
Paul

 

[zig]

Ok today was my first day using the EI method as i got my dry fertiliser through the post this morning

There's only one thing thats confusing me and thats regarding nitrates.

My nitrates from my tap water are zero, and my tank has between 0 and <5 ppm even after 1 week. So when i go about my weekly water changes do i simply add 1-2 ppm of nitrate everyday.

If this is the case wont my nitrates only really reach 10-30 ppm just before im due to do a water change? And so resetting it all back to zero. So my plants will only get at most, 1 full day of the recomended nitrates.

Help please
Paul

[snapback]881897[/snapback]​

Ok if your flucuating between 0-5 ppm nitrate you are better off assuming in the beginning that you have 0, and just follow the guide and bring it up slowly add 1ppm today, 2ppm tomorrow, 3ppm the next day and so forth, it will probably take about a week to get it to 10ppm, as the plants will be consuming it also along the way, when you do the 50% water change next week add 10ppm KNO3, and then during the week do a nitrate test, and find out approx how much no3 has been consumed or depleted and add that amount of KNO3 to keep the nitrate level at 10ppm, basically you do 2 topups during the week to keep the levels at 10ppm, now if you find the plants are consuming it really fast, then add a little every day so that it never runs out, if you do this it will never run out and you will never have 0 nitrate.

After a while you will find the depletion rate is fairly constant unless you do major changes to the tank add or remove plants etc, at that stage you can do away with the test kits, because you can be fairly confident you are adding enough each time, but that will take a few weeks to really understand what you are doing, just keep testing on a regular basis until you feel a bit more comfitable with the dosing routine.

Anyway hope that explains it a bit better, just ask if your not sure about anything else.

 

[houndour]

thanks for taking the time to write the article zig