# Low tech dirted tank - ei dose amount?



## Pinkmummy79 (4 Dec 2014)

Some of you will have seen my ramblings over on the dark side, my change from high tech to low and dirty 260.

I feel I need to commence dosing ei and am unsure as to how much, after much reading and taking in many differing opinions i'm now full of information but cant seem to put it to much use DOH..

My tank is 260 litres
For high tech dosing I used the TNC ei calculator and this is what I mixed:
in solution (1000ml)
Macro - dosing 125 ml 3 x pw
31g KN03
12g KH2P04
74g MgS04

Trace
7.9g TNC trace in solution (1000ml) dosing 125 ml 2 x pw

so
with low tech, and yes it's dirted so some nutirents are available, but if say I wanted to start dosing at 25% full ei, would I mix the same strength as above but just dose less?
125 x .25 = 31.25ml once a week/fortnight?
or would I actually recalculate the ei mix to reduce down to 25% of the salts and still dose as I was?

thanks


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## darren636 (4 Dec 2014)

I use less than 1/4 dosage on my low light low tech 260

Works well


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## Jose (4 Dec 2014)

You can dose once a weak and 1/10th the normal EI dose.


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## Pinkmummy79 (4 Dec 2014)

Jose said:


> You can dose once a weak and 1/10th the normal EI dose.


 so :
Macro - dosing
31g KN03 x 1/10
12g KH2P04 x 1/10
74g MgS04 x1/10 and dose how much a week?

or

Macro - dosing 125ml x 1/10 per week
 31g KN03 full ei
12g KH2P04 full ei
74g MgS04 full ei


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## Pinkmummy79 (4 Dec 2014)

do I just mix the same levels and reduce the volume of solution dosed then?
or do I need to reduce the salts in the mix to 1/10th?


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## Jose (4 Dec 2014)

The same as you were doing before but dilute your fert to 1/10th the concentration. So if you have an EI solution prepared, mix one part of it to 9 parts of water. Or you can just dose 1/10th the ammount of fert you were dosing before.


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## Pinkmummy79 (4 Dec 2014)

And just dose this once a week to start ?


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## Tim Harrison (4 Dec 2014)

Yep should be fine, I dose after the weekly water change. The above dosing regime presupposes that macrophytes in lower energy tanks grow 5 to 10 times slower than in higher energy setups, and it also assumes that “fish food” indirectly contributes about 80% to 90% of the nutrient load. As your plants grow you might want to up the dose to 1/5th concentration and/or dose a couple of times a week.


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## Pinkmummy79 (22 Dec 2014)

I'm back, not started dosing yet but want to this week.
Still a little dumb I'm afraid over the volume to dose.
I've thinned down an existing mix to 1/10th solution
With my high tech set up i dosed 130ml of macro 3 x a week and 130ml of trace twice a week.
So am i starting off by just dosing 130ml once a week or the full weekly volume 390ml of the 1/10th solution once a week?
Sorry for this
Happy Christmas too


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## Edvet (23 Dec 2014)

IF you gave 130 of the original strength, you can give 130 of the 10 times diluted, this way you give 1/10 of the original amount.
When i went low energy i gave app 1/3 of my original amount, no problems encountered.


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## Iain Sutherland (23 Dec 2014)

or just throw some dry salts into the tank a couple of times a week and forget about it.... my highly complex formula


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