# super hard water



## danmil3s (22 Feb 2011)

hi guys after a bit of reassurance ive read loads of times plants grow fine in hard water but my waters silly hard 32dgh. is anyone haveing success in water this hard ive been trying to grow plant for ages now and ive tried every thing more ferts more flow and better flow pattens different was of injecting co2 im starting to think it must be the hardens if someone else is doing ok with water this hard maybe im still doing something wrong. when i had ro water stuff just grew no ferts no flow no clue.


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## Radik (3 Mar 2011)

Here more scientific folks would tell you that with high hardness plants have harder time to absorb nutrition's if I remember correctly. You have to doze a lot Co2 as well if your KH is too high. But you did not tell us yours parameters, hardware and fertilization method and what exact problems you have, do they die out or are they stunned etc.. so folks would not be able to advice you.


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## danmil3s (3 Mar 2011)

i didn't really want advice was just wondering if anybody was actually growing plants in super hard water. as ive blamed and messed about with everything else. my plants that where in my ro tank grew with no help crypts and big sword. now they grow but not so well. and more complicated stuff just dies


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## ceg4048 (3 Mar 2011)

Radik said:
			
		

> Here more scientific folks would tell you that with high hardness plants have harder time to absorb nutrition's if I remember correctly.


No I don't think they would say anything like that at all. There is no relationship whatsoever between KH/GH and the ability of plants to uptake nutrients or CO2. However there are a couple of suspect species that have either KH or GH limitations.



			
				danmil3s said:
			
		

> ...my plants that where in my ro tank grew with no help crypts and big sword. now they grow but not so well. and more complicated stuff just dies...


Have you tried messing around with lower light intensities? I hear this comparison all the time and people always leave out the important bits. There are a lot of factors that come to play with plant growth and unless you set up a group of tanks with control of all parameters it's impossible to draw a conclusion. I use super hard water all the time and I don't have any trouble so there must be something that has gone wrong in the tank or, there is something else in the water that is not related to hardness, perhaps an herbicide or high sodium content that is doing the damage. Have you looked at the municipal water report?

Cheers,


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## danmil3s (4 Mar 2011)

ok Clive i know you know your stuff, so ill take your word for it its not the hardness. ive found the water report doesn't mean a lot to me if im honest. would you mind having a look if you've got a minute.
http://waterquality.anglianwater.com/report.aspx 
much appreciate your help again.


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## ceg4048 (4 Mar 2011)

Dan, the link doesn't work for me. Could you provide a post code. It doesn't have to be yours specifically, just any one in or near the zone.

Cheers,


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## danmil3s (4 Mar 2011)

Sorry clive is it just the post code you need if so PE29 7jz should do the trick thanks


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## danmil3s (5 Mar 2011)

sorry Clive i was away from my pc last night this is the page you meed  http://waterquality.anglianwater.com/map.aspx enter the post code pe29 7jz   then the link on the right that says "obtain a full Drinking Water Quality Report for this zone"  should give you what you need thanks


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## ceg4048 (6 Mar 2011)

OK mate, I've had a look at the report. Are you kidding me? This water is awesome for plants. According to the report, the water is not "super hard" at all. It's only "quite hard" at a mere 18 dGH and 10 dKH but it is very high in TDS at 727 microseimens. OK, so you won't be breeding any soft water fish with this on a regular basis but it's got top notch nutrient levels. One never likes to see any level of Sodium, but 46ppm ought not to be too much of an issue.

So really there is not much wrong with this water unless you are using some kind of salt based water softener and then putting that water in the tank.

If a water softener is not being used, then that eliminates just about all of the tap water possibilities. Unless you are trying to grow a tankful of Tonina, you shouldn't have any trouble. We really would need to take a look at your technique, and you need to describe just exactly what the symptoms are and what your setup is. I'll tell you right now that I'm 95% confident you have a CO2 issue. Why am I so certain? Because 95% of all plant problems are CO2 related.

I'm happy to take a closer look if you'd care to provide more details mate.

Cheers,


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## danmil3s (7 Mar 2011)

thanks Clive at least i know its not the water. so im going to try a couple of things im going to add mg with my ferts looks like my waters not quite high enough is that right. ive lowered my light just 2 strips t5ho now. except when my co2 packed up I've not had algae issues but this can only help right. the last think I've tweaked my flow  hopefully the diagram helps. this is a side view of my tank. the blue arrow is water flow from a 12000lph power head. i realised i had a huge dead spot the green shaded area. this was caused because the power head was pulling water straight up. so i've put plastic under it represented by the yellow scribble. now water only enters from the top and the dead spot is the red area hope this makes sense. should i be doing any thin else or should i just wait and see what happens ive been turning up the co2 bit by bit since i added 2 boyu in line atomizers. D/C is green


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## ceg4048 (7 Mar 2011)

Hi mate,
             OK, are you sure about that 12,000 LPH rating? if it is that high then it might have been better to split that amount of flow rate up between a couple of pumps to get a more even distribution across the length of the tank. Also you should try moving it up as close to the surface as you can and pointing the nozzle straight ahead instead of angling it down. As a result of this positioning the upwards pull of the pump will be exactly what you want.

Don't forget that there are many different symptoms of CO2 starvation. Algae is one form, but melting and disintegrating is another. It just depends on the severity and on other factors. Reducing the light intensity, increasing the Mg and increasing the injection rate are all steps in the right direction.

Cheers,


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## danmil3s (8 Mar 2011)

hi Clive its a claimed 12000 far east e bay job 
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Dual-12000L-H-Fis ... 4157730574
i do have 2 one in the middle of each half of the tank there is another one behind the bog wood.as you've suggested I've moved them up and aimed them foreword the flow patten seems a bit more haphazard 



the blue arrow is the flow now the yellow area is the dead spot the purple spiral bit doesn't really move just spins. the red arrow is what I get if I remove the plastic, the flow just goes straight back then misses the plants. is the purple bit normal thanks again Clive


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## ceg4048 (9 Mar 2011)

OK, well if ebay says so, it must be true. We'll have to accept the numbers - for now.

The blue pattern is what we want to see. It still looks like you have them mounted too far below the water line, although I can just make out some ripples on the surface. The higher you can get the pumps  the more you will broaden out the patterns. You might even try point the nozzles slightly up if there is some mechanical restriction preventing you from moving them closer to the surface.

If the yellow area is still getting stagnation then move it this way towards the viewer a little. Don't worry too much about the purple vortices or the red return flow. All we need is to broaden out the blue pattern so that I get movement transiting through the crypts and heading closer to the back wall. If the pump is mounted high, it will pull the flow up along the wall.

JamesC also demonstrated that you could mount a diffuser just below the inlet grill and the impellers would chop up the CO2 bubbles and send them into the pattern.

This is so cool, but before we get too carried away - are you sure about these patterns though? How are you determining that they form in these geometries? Do you insert little pieces of white paper with forceps at certain locations and watch them dance around, or do you use coloured dye - or are you using The Force?

Cheers,


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## danmil3s (9 Mar 2011)

ok thanks Clive i cant move them up any more because the spray bars in the way its not as low as it looks 1.5" from the surface to top of pump. just for extra info the spray bars feed from an fx5 and claimed 2000lph submersible, which is running my boyu in lines. As i cant move it up ive pointed higher. loads of surface movement now. the flow pattern does seem improved. to tell ive been watching it using the bubbles from the spray bar and what ever else is floating round as a guide like tiny bits of plants and stuff (don't worry ill catch them with a net before they become dirt) i like the idea of a dye how does that work.


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## ceg4048 (10 Mar 2011)

danmil3s said:
			
		

> .. cant move them up any more because the spray bars in the way its not as low as it looks 1.5" from the surface to top of pump.


OK mate, I get it now. A bit of an optical illusion that was. Sorry about that.

Don't be afraid to try radical approaches such as moving the spraybars below the pumps (space and other factors permitting of course).



			
				danmil3s said:
			
		

> i like the idea of a dye how does that work.


Oh, I do harebrained schemes like putting food dyes, or cranberry juice or any liquid with a colour in the filter and then turning it on and watching the flow patterns - like they do in wind tunnels. It makes a right mess of course but you get a good idea of what's going on. You can even squirt bromo blue in the pump inlet and actually get a quick snapshot of the pH profile which kind of gives an indication of CO2 profile. You need a lot of bromo though, and because they sell it in those piddly little vials it gets expensive.

Err..of course you'd do all this without any fish in the tank...  

Cheers,


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## ceg4048 (10 Mar 2011)

Oh, by the way Dan, you know in the very first image I was seeing this enormous rock on the near side of the tank and kept thinking to myself "why doesn't he just move that enormous rock out of the way if he's getting poor flow in the yellow area?" then I saw the latest snapshot and the rock was gone. I thought; "Well done mate". Then, I took a closer look and realized to my horror, it wasn't a rock, it was a rock lobster! I mean it was humongous. It was like creature from the black lagoon. Do you think it's possible that this creature is killing your plants? Just a thought. Have to explore every avenue and all that...

Cheers,


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## danmil3s (10 Mar 2011)

thanks Clive i think with your help my flow pattens look good ill give it a week or 2 and see what the plant say. i might try the food dyes thing in my plant only tank sounds interesting.as for the rock hes a common pleco and the smaller of  2 at about 9" his mate is 10" and i blame them for digging up most of my plants, they have a habit of laying on them as well. i am trying to re home them viewtopic.php?f=23&t=14839&p=153815#p153815 not easy with such big fish. shame as ive had them years before i was in to plants. but i think most of my problem was technique as you say. the plants look ill not battered. hopefully im on the right track now. only the plants will tell i guess. thanks agian


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