# Do I really need CO2 for my 200l tank? & if so how much?



## Jafooli

Hi

So I'm a bit stressed out and depressed at the moment lol and I'm not as knowledgeable or experienced as you guys so I need some help please.

Tank: 200l 2x T8 bulbs, 2x internal filters. Fluval u4's
Ammonia 0ppm
Nitrite 0ppm
Nitrate 40ppm
PH 7.4
TDS 476
KH 12
GH 21

Dose EI pre mixed, and do not use KNO3, K2SO4 for potassium.

So my tank was fine & algae free, I said I want more growth especially on my carpeting plants, cranked CO2 up, and boom algae outbreak, system crashed literally, all my carpet plants now covered in brown algae, crypts and echinodorus plants eating them selfs, green smudge and brown smudge stuff all on my tank glass, tank & plants were took over with algae, green spot algae on all plants, glass. Just a total mess.

CO2 before was at 1.8bps, I upped it to 2.6, algae outbreak happens, so did I add to much CO2? so much that the algae started to benefit it more? Another good thing to point out is, my tank is low light, low demanding plants..... I am only trying my luck with carpeting plants.... so maybe there was just to much?

Anyway few days ago noticed clown loach acting weird, other fish gasping, CO2 somehow turned it's self up to 3bps, lol, from charts I think I might of been in the 90ppm area, anyway I've lowered it all the way down to a new lowest, 1.5bps, and not sure if regulator is stable, but at the moment it is.

Now when I look back I think I was stupid, example if tank 1 had high light, high demanding plants and fast growers... articles and people say online aim for 30ppm.. so in this high spec tank it has 30ppm of CO2 .... great, tank 2 (my tank) low light, low demanding plants, I have 30ppm of CO2, what happens here?? surely my tank don't benefit the same? my plants will use less co2?

I'm nearly overstocked with fish as it is, so if I removed my CO2, would they give enough co2 to my tank? my girlfriends fluval ebi has no co2, no ferts, but yet plants grow, slow but grow.

Obviously I want to achieve the best growth and give my plants everything they need, but I'm just confused, I'm not blessed with a high end tank with high lights, and high demanding plants, I would much prefer a tank like that, but sadly I got to make do for now, and everything I learned is from the internet and forums like this one 

So where did this algae outbreak come from? & do I need CO2? if so how much?

I hope someone can help me, or give me some advice, I just don't know what to do, and don't get me wrong I really enjoy growing plants and this hobby, but my tank is just depressing me at the moment, I guess I might of reached the point off, I want better lights, high demanding plants and not crypts etc, but If I can get this sorted I know I can enjoy my tank again with out upgrading etc, as I can't afford that now and this is a new 200l tank  I just feel like I have no idea what I'm doing no more, I'm questioning my self


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## kirk

I'm thinking water changes, and ferts?


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## Jafooli

Hi ya kirk,

My normal routine is 50% w.c every Sunday, while I'm not great at all this EI dosing, I once learnt how to understand the dosing calculators about a year ago, but when I compared it to the guidelines of where I purchased my starter kit and what they recommended, I found most of my Macro's were in the weekly PPM range.

Macro: 500ml water
1tsp Potassium Phosphate 
6tsp Magnesium Sulfate 
I removed the Potassium Nitrate and use Potassium Sulfate,  I dose 3/4 dry.

Micro - 1tsp APF Chelated Trace - 500ml water.

10ml per 50ltr they recommended , I dose 40ml  

So yeah this has worked fine for me, but ever since I upped the CO2, the algae just took over in like a few days. Its started to get better over the last couple of days, but still there.


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## kirk

I'm puzzled as I've had the same problems  recently which in the end had me ripping everything out and starting again. After trying black out etc I gave up. I have found in high flow areas and high co2 I get algae complete opposite of what I was led to believe. I change our water 3-4 Times a week with Ro but only 25-50 ltrs at a time on a 120 ltr.   my sons low Tec tank is slow but spotless with few water changes.  The tank I first mentioned Is now drifting towards low Tec.  I'm sorry I dont have a strait helpfull answer for you but as you probably know clives your man to wait for.


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## ceg4048

Ripping everything out and starting again is always a bad practice. The results will always be the same unless the hobbyist changes and learns how to exercise some level of control.

The answer to these questions are obvious. The OP assumes that the nutrient levels in the tank are high, ans this assumption is based on useless test kit reading. So he believes his test kit and instead of dosing the proper NO3 nutrient levels he substitutes a nutrient powder that he doesn't really need.

Read this thread Potting soil, co2, crypts and no ferts | UK Aquatic Plant Society

Then you will see that when you substitute powders without ever knowing the truth of what's in the water, it leaves you vulnerable to nutrient deficiency.

As mentioned in that thread when you limit the amount of CO2 you then limit the uptake requirement of the nutrients. When you then remove the CO2 limitation, this drives a higher uptake requirement for nutrients. High CO2 therefore exposes the fact that the nutrient levels are low, and so the plants suffer nutrient deficiency.

Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Hi thanks for the replies,

My brain don't have the capacity to understand everything 100% lol, so I do try my best and I apologize in advance.

So I read the thread you posted, and I presume from what I read is that when I turned my CO2 up, there just wasn't enough nutrients in the water column, hence the deficiencies I started to see and organic waste build up on the plant leafs which leads me to.....

Can I presume all the brown smudgy algae that started to appear on all my leafs and glass, was actually the plant waste from where I turned the CO2 up to much which therefore made the plants produce waste quicker?

I think that's how I understood it from what I read in that thread, "more light, co2, nutrients etc more organic waste"

So that would explain why my tank was working better at 1.8bps of CO2, as the speed and balance of the tank was much better?

Or am I totally wrong about this? and I need to read that thread a few mores times lol.

If that was how all the algae appeared then great, I can hopefully solve and fix my tank, I've already lowered the CO2, so hopefully the plants will use the nutrient's a bit slower and not use them all up.

Also like I said my tank is close to being overstocked, so I have a wide range of fish, if I was to stop CO2 injection, could I still dose ferts at a lower dose, and my tank would still be fine? just much slower growth rates etc?

I've also noticed I've got two fish that are ill, they are struggling to breath, and are also struggling to even swim correctly, there at the bottom gasping for oxygen, they then hang at the surface trying to get oxygen, I already noticed gasping hence why I checked my bubble rate and noticed it was to high, I think it might be to late for them, I'm so disappointed in my self, and feel like I've let my fish down tbh, I just hope my other fish can pull through as I did notice a lot of gasping....

Also Clive the last time you helped me was with my light and GH & KH, my GH was 16 and KH 8 at that time, we came to somewhat of a conclusion it could of been my Eco Complete that raised the GH and KH so high, since then my GH and KH are now.... 21GH and 12KH why would they of gone even more higher? I don't understand? I thought after a few months they would of gone down dramatically, its probably making issues for my fish and my tempts in breeding some, I don't like it being this high, I don't come across many if any people with it this high, not even my girlfriends tank in the same house is even close to how high mine are, and in her tank I do get normal nitrate readings.... which leads me to...

I have tried so many Nitrate kits, I know or think you hate them and test kits lol, but my water report, ( South East Water) says its 50 mg NO3/I, I think 50ppm? and in my tank I'm sure the test kits say its around 30-40ppm its in the red either way, and I've tried with 3 different API kits, that's why I don't dose nitrate, so you think I should just forgot the kit and dose nitrate? and not worry about nitrate poisoning or anything? I will take your advice over mine, so please let me know, and I can keep an eye on fish If I do go down that route.

I also don't think my dosing is to much of a concern, I think its more CO2, I hope I'm correct in saying my tank will benefit much more now I've turned my CO2 down.
Hope you can help.

Thanks.


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## ceg4048

Well, the plants have just told you that you do not have 50ppm and that you don't even have 30-40ppm. I'm pretty sure I would have mentioned to you that nitrate poisoning is an illusion spread by the people who sell nitrate test kits. NO3 test kits are the worst of the worst, so if you want to spend you energy fretting over NO3 If you still believe in this myth, then simply keep the CO2 low and that will throttle down the nutrient uptake demand.

As far as the hardness and alkalinity, again, this is something that I never worry about and I've run tanks with numbers higher than what you report without any problems, but then again, I've not worried about breeding. For breeding, if you have specific requirements or objectives then you'll need to cut the water with RO. You also might have some form of Calcium/Magnesium and Carbonates in your hardscape or substrate that is dissolving into the water.

Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Thanks Clive for taking your time to help.

I will try and keep it short and simple, can you just confirm something for me, before I give my self false confidence.

You mention this equation in the thread you linked me and the paragraphs below kind of confirm what I'm about to ask but just want to make sure I'm correct as like I'm said I'm not the most intelligent.
The equation: Light===>CO2>==>Nutrients=>Growth Rate=>Organic Waste.

So I always assumed when people use CO2, every person with there tank should aim for 30ppm, but from what I think you have taught me is that's not case, if your light is not as high, so on the lower side like mine, I can then lower my CO2, which then allows me to lower my dosing, which then will also lower the organic waste my plants produces, yey lol, am I right? I know you didn't specifically mention low/high light, but obviously a high light tank, the plants there are going to benefit more with higher co2 and a higher dosing regime and the tank overall will require more maintenance.

Also can you secondly confirm what all the brown stuff is that over took my tank and plants leaves?, am I correct in saying this was organic waste the plant produced due to me increasing the CO2? and because I probably didn't have the best flow like a high spec tank would it managed to take hold?, I then also started to see nutrient defiances because off the increase off CO2, therefore driving the nutrient uptake.

I think that's how I understood your equation, so for me personally I now know I don't have to achieve 30ppm for a great tank as there are other matters to take into account..... my goal like you mention in the thread also is to have a more low maintenance tank, still with weekly 50% w.c just less nutrient dosing, and much less co2 being added. I think this would benefit my tank especially with the kind of plants I have, crypts, low light also, so it would make sense to have the CO2 a bit lower, other wise I'm make it hard for my self like I soon found out when I increased it.

So to clarify basically lower co2, means nutrients will be used much slower, therefore you can cut back a bit on nutrients, and the plants will produce less organic waste, increase the co2 and the opposite happens, and that's probably why I had loads of defiances appear and lots of brown crap on my plants from the organic waste.

Thanks again for ya help, so hope you can quickly confirm I'm on the right path, or tell me I'm totally wrong lol. 

I also need to make a separate thread as it seems my regulator is increasing its bps on its own, it slowly increases over time, and I'm needing to re-adjust it each day, so will need to sort that out now  !!


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## ian_m

Jafooli said:


> Also can you secondly confirm what all the brown stuff is that over took my tank and plants leaves


Diatoms is usual brown stuff.
James' Planted Tank - Algae Guide. Generally will go away as tank matures and/or will be scoffed by fish like otto's.


Jafooli said:


> therefore you can cut back a bit on nutrients,


Don't reduce, nutrients are cheap, dose as per EI, that way you know the ppm. No test kits needed. Too much won't harm fish or plants. I had over 300ppm nitrate in my tank for a couple of days after a pump failure, fish fine, plants fine, no algae. Reducing nutrients is the start of the slippery slope to problems.


Jafooli said:


> A also need to make a separate thread as it seems my regulator is increasing its bps on its own, it slowly increases over time, and I'm needing to re-adjust it each day, so will need to sort that out now !!


You have a leak somewhere.


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## ceg4048

Hiya mate,
				  Yes, your understanding is correct. Using CO2 doesn't mean you have to max everything out, so you don't need high light because light acts as a throttle, and in that equation, as you lower the light then you immediately lower the need to have high CO2 and high nutrients. Of course there is a range of required nutrients for each level of CO2. It's not one value of nutrients for one value of CO2.

Unfortunately, you upset the apple cart when you increased the gas. You drove the equation to the right, but your nutrition was lower than the minimum required. If, for example, you increased the injection rate again, but this time increased the dosing levels, then there would be no problems. You were not dosing the scheduled amounts, so when you increased the CO2 the wheels fell off the wagon because there was not enough nutrition to support the increased amount of CO2.

The brown debris could easily be some kind of diatomic algae, there are thousands of varieties, or it could be a combination of waste and algae. It's difficult to tell without any sort of images, but I tend to think it's a type of diatom. Just do more water changes and make sure you wipe that stuff off the surface. If it does not come off easily then it's some type of Green Spot Algae (GSA). More water changes/cleaning and more dosing will sort that out in short order. Then, if you wish, you can lower the nutrient level again.

I can't tell what's happening with your regulator. Is the content of the cylinder getting near empty? Sometimes, when the bottle is low on CO2 the gas escapes more quickly. You may just need to re-fill. Normally, one has to open the needle vale as time goes on, but as you approach empty the gas escapes and rushes out. I don't know for sure if that's your case.

Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Hey Ian and Clive,

Ah my head feels cleared now, its good to know I understood correct, I now have some self belief again.

Everything you just said above is exactly how I am thinking right now, so I'm finally on the right wave length.

Also Ian you mention not to reduce, the only reason I want to is, I was dosing 28ml of Macro/Micro into my tank on alternative days and my tank and plants were doing fine! , and I then upped the CO2 for more growth, and all these problems occurred which I now know why , anyway I upped the dosing all the way to 40ml, which is what's recommended from the place I purchased my starter kit but I managed to find the 28ml mark from my own experience worked great, but like mentioned above, the CO2 just upset the apple cart as clive says lol, so now I've lowered my CO2, I can hopefully slowly get back to my old routine, and even lower the co2 a bit more to keep things more easy for my self, and yeah your correct there not to expensive, so I can hopefully just go around 30ml mark, but will keep at 40ml for now, I just like to get the extra week out of it. :L

My CO2 FE is around the 5.5kg mark when I last checked which was a few days ago so it has maybe a couple more weeks life before I change, I never had this problem with my old FE when it got low, so I'm not convinced that's the problem, hopefully its a leak like Ian mentioned, I did change some tubing, and I changed my check valve, but its still increasing really slowly, grrrr.. If it's not a leak, and cylinder issue, what can I do next?

Also I hope this helps you confirm what algae I had, or if it was organic waste, also to point out these plants were green and healthy before I increased co2, but we now know what happened, and as you can cleary see there are some deficiencies in the pictures, potassium being one of them, but the brown stuff I have no idea, and If it is diatoms then I'm even more confused, as my tank is fully matured, and the way it took over my tank in a matter of days after increasing CO2, makes me think it has to be something else?

 
 
 

Oh I also did about 30% w.c today to help, and my next major w.c is Sunday, my tank looks 70% better already, my stauro repens does not look as good as it use to, but also don't look as bad as the picture anymore, I just hope this all clears up, and my otto's are lazy lol, I also did add 10 root tabs today to help as-well, and I've been removing any leafs with green spot on them, and I tried to rub as much off my stauro repens but the leafs are so tiny its quite hard to get them all.

Once again thanks Clive for confirming that for me, its so much better when you understand things.


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## ceg4048

Yeah, that's algae. Definitely GSA.
GSA is caused by any combination of low CO2 and low PO4. Since you had an increase in CO2 it's logical to conclude that the CO2 increase exposes low PO4.

You need to remove all those leaves immediately. Hack away until all is clear and resume your previous regime. Or, if you cannot control the injection rate increase then you have little choice but to increase the dosing of ALL nutrients until you solve the gas issue.

It could be that there is some debris trapped in the regulator causing an internal leakage.

Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Ah right that's good to know I already suspected it was GSA on the stem plant and have already removed the leafs ,its also a nightmare to clean of the glass, I clean it every week, I guess everyone gets it on there glass 

Well hopefully now I've lowered the CO2, my tank can start to sort its self out, and I will keep dosing on the higher side for now and most likely just keep it that way.

I checked the BPS today, and its pretty much fine, I've ordered a new bubble counter, co2 tubing, and if that don't solve the issue, hopefully someone can let me know how I check for any debris in the regulator. I hope its just a leak. If it were a leak I presume the leak has to be before the bubble counter? as how would a leak further up the system cause a fluctuation in the bps? The increase is so small I set it at 1.2 bps, it moved to 1.23 yesterday and this morning its 1.25, but obviously its still a issue as it keeps rising, for example when I set it at 2.6bps and it made its way to 3bps.

I also presume the brown dust on my repens and glosso was just diatoms then? still strange how they appeared as my tank is fully matured, and its now nearly ruined all them plants leafs, although its slowly disappearing.

Anyway thanks again for everyone's help and being patient with me, and hopefully I'm now back on track!


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## Jafooli

Hey just a update on my situation, my main problem now is the diatoms but to start here is the situation now with my CO2.

I received my new up bubble counter and polyurethane co2 tubing, I hooked it all up on Monday, its still fluctuating by an extra bubble every time the regulator switches on, which is the same pattern as what was happening before, just a bit less now.

Here is an example and bearing in mind I am aiming for around 1bps to keep things easy for now:
Monday 58 bubbles per minute, turned co2 off then on to test stability, it increased to 60 bubbles.
Tuesday co2 on, 61 bubbles,
Wednesday co2 on, 62 bubbles.

So its increasing much less but still slowly increasing, I have no idea what's going on, I'm 99% sure its no leak, I keep the system short and simple so it would be easier to detect any leaks and I can't, I guess one thought that passed my mind was when the CO2 system turns on the initial burst is somehow tweaking the needle valve that tiny bit, if that's possible? I know the FE is on the lower side and will need replacing soon, but didn't think it was low enough to cause this problem. If anyone knows anything I could try please let me know, my plan for now is to use the FE another 2 weeks or so, then replace and see how the problem goes on a brand new FE, if its still happening I can contact the manufacturer and see what they recommend.

Now for the main issue, which I don't want anyone or Clive feel the need to repeat them self's, as I think so far that's probably been the case with me, So luckily I found this thread with some research Diatom dilemma... | UK Aquatic Plant Society which has been a great read and some others, which leads me to believe Diatoms can also appear because of to much light. I know my tank is fully matured, and these diatoms were never a issue before, and I'm not sure its my light either, it must be one of the two though, or something else I've missed when reading.

I presume from other threads as-well, a good plan of action for me would be to do a blackout for 4 days? but I don't want to do that then have it all come back again, so what's the most likely cause of the diatoms in my tank? when the plants got weakened, has the diatoms just took a hold? when they get a hold do they just keep spreading/multiplying? they are still appearing on new healthy growth.  I've also read any change you do in your tank , aka, increase ferts, co2, it can take up to three weeks for the differences to be seen, so am I just going have to wait a bit more longer? but obviously my main concern is its just infecting my new growth and therefore weakening the leafs and killing them.

Does my tank just need the reset button pushed? aka blackout, and then hopefully my plants can start to adapt to the new environment changes?

I feel like I'm in such a lower league to everyone else on here, I mean any plant in my tank, all I have to do is Google it or look at others people's tanks, and I see a totally different healthy plant, I cant take it no more. I need to step up and I need to step up fast. I've re-educated my self this past week and tried to refresh my memory. I want to grow the perfect glosso or stauro repens, stem plants not a bunch of sorry looking plants, the only plants doing great are my crypts.

So I hope you can help me Clive, and let me know how I can eradicate these diatoms, so I can get to work on growing my plants again, I know its not as easy as just dosing fertilizers and adding co2 to get a healthy looking plant/tank, but I do plan to raise my game and concentrate on getting my ferts, co2, flow, maintenance to a much better balance, I know my flow could do with improving at the bottom of the tank. I also don't think my ceramic diffuser is the worlds best, I still get lots of CO2 reaching the surface, but I will keep trying to improve these.


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## ceg4048

Hi mate,
				Yeah I would just do a huge water change, then do the blackout and carry on. It's really not that big of a deal. Turn off CO2 and dose nutrients just before. Then just cover the tank and wait.

You need to be sure that it's diatomic algae though. If the algae comes off easy when you wipe the leaf between your thumb and forefinger then it's most likely diatoms, but if it's rough and doesn't come off then it's most likely some kind of Green Spot Algae (GSA) even if it's brown and not green.

Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Cheers Clive,

Yeah its rubbing off from the Glosso, but even then the leafs are still quite damaged, and I can't rub it all off. So I'll do a W/C today, and do I dose the Macro and Micro together after? or just stick to the Macro? as that's what I normally dose after w/c... 

I'll also add my air pump in and raise my filters to provide more oxygen. Thanks for the quick reply, and will update after blackout lol.


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## Jafooli

Tank is in blackout mode, I just hope there is no light entering through the black bags, I've gave it 3 coats all the way around, I raised both filters to provide loads of surface movement and chose to leave the small air pump out. I hope my fish will be aright, I cant see how the oxygen is going to enter the tank through all them bags? like once the oxygen gets used up, where will it replenish? probably such a dumb question, but hope that makes sense. I did a blackout before on a smaller tank but had a air pump in that time around, so I hope the fish will be aright and really hope no light can get through, probably going to keep my room as dark as possible as-well, dam its a depressing room in there right now, not sure what's worse to look at bin bags or algae.

Fingers crossed until Sunday afternoon.


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## ceg4048

There will be no problems getting O2 into the tank. It's not air tight. You can use air pump in there if it will be too stressful.​​Cheers,​


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## Jafooli

Hey Clive

Just an update, I've done the 4 day blackout, the tank has improved overall considerably, I see some GSA still remains but all diatoms are gone. Its made such a difference, I can finally see green leafs again. I presume GSA can survive a blackout better than other algae's, diatoms?

I also do suffer from BBA, only on my wood or filter outlet, I already know a blackout can't kill it, hardly much can, but how come it can survive a blackout? I'm sure you've probably mentioned that on here somewhere, so if you can point me there, or just let me know that would be great as I'm quite interested to know, also if a tank was being pumped with oxygen would this kill the BBA, as my girlfriends tank has it as-well, but I've added a air pump in there, and it seems the BBA is actually shrinking in size. Reason I ask is I read its caused because of fluctuations in CO2, so a tank full of oxygen would have less fluctuation?

Anyway below is some new pictures, the plants look much better, I uncovered the tank and did a 50% water change, I made a new Macro and Micro solution last night, I also added a little extra of each nutrient to the mix, and added half the recommended dose of KNO3, as you know I normally leave this out and dose K2SO4 for the potassium as the test kit says I have high nitrate, but yes I know there wrong now, thanks to your help, but just to be on the safe side I only added half, and will continue adding K2SO4 as I normally do, so now I should have extra nutrients in my solutions and I will continue to dose the full amount. Then at least I know I will have no deficiency problems, aka this GSA is annoying, I presume its from low phosphates so hopefully that will eliminate that problem. Also out of curiosity I read multiple times you say KNO3 is not harmful to fish, how high does KNO3 have to be before it would do harm? say 70ppm for example or even 100ppm.

I also bleached my diffuser all day yesterday where as I normally bleach it for an hour, I left pure thick bleach on it for hours, when I fired it up today, It worked better than what it did when I purchased it brand new, I'm not sure if your meant to bleach them brand new? but its never worked so good, Its like literally pure mist, I can't even see any bubbles, its like I've gone out and purchased a £40 diffuser!

I've lowered one filter to provide more flow to the bottom area of my tank, and I've highered one and that's producing mid-top flow around the tank with some surface ripple, I've pointed both filters in the same direction to act like a river, the CO2 is getting pushed around much better than what it was especially now its actually a mist rather than fine bubbles. I still think there is more room for improvement with my flow, especially around the bottom of my tank so maybe it would be worth looking into a decent powerhead which can be rotated.

I will also continue to work on my CO2 diffusion and monitor it everyday to see how stable it is, and if its still un-stable I will order a new FE and see if that fixes it. If I start the week at 1BPS, and at the end of the weeks its 1.3BPS, what kind of problems would I expect to hit? more algae? BBA? or is .3 an acceptable fluctuation? I Would be interested to know just encase I can't solve the issue straight away? I don't want to go down that route so I am going to try to get that solved so I can do everything the best I can, and that's also to keep focusing on good constant CO2, and good flow distribution, and there's not much I can do about light as its a Fluval roma tank, but the more I read, I can presume there is more room for error with T8's.

Here are the pictures, as expected the plants have cleaned up quite nice:









I've still got a lot more maintenance to do, the odd one or two leafs still need taking out, I've done so much today, but then when you sit and have a look you notice more things which need pruning or picking out lol.

Thanks again for all your help and putting me back on track, I think the main thing I've took away is that not everyone needs to pump in 30ppm of CO2, and the lower the CO2, the less harder your plants work and the slower they will take up the nutrients. I think that's going to help me a lot to combat these deficiency problems, and then I can concentrate more on CO2, Flow, and hopefully get a algae free tank with thriving plants!

If that still don't work out for me in the future I'm sure your then point out the problem for me, but for now I feel more prepared than I was before. I just hope I can get these harder carpeting plants to thrive now, I also presume from what I've read light is not much of an issue and its more of the driving force, so If I get everything balanced, co2, flow, nutrients etc, there should be no issue regarding light? just that they will grow slower, as the driving force of my tank will be much lower than that of a higher lit tank. ( I did read the article you wrote about the car being the light, something similar, so that's how I understood it lol )

Light is still my weak point, but I think its safe to say I can still grow plants successfully if I keep everything running smoothly, but on the other hand maybe I am wrong, and my bulbs are pretty useless for carpeting plants. I know it won't be as easy, but in regards to everything else, it should give me more room for error as everything in my tank will be being used less like in your digram: Light===>CO2>==>Nutrients=>Growth Rate=>Organic Waste.

Thanks again, for all your help and time.


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## ceg4048

Jafooli said:


> Anyway below is some new pictures, the plants look much better, I uncovered the tank and did a 50% water change, I made a new Macro and Micro solution last night, I also added a little extra of each nutrient to the mix, and added half the recommended dose of KNO3, as you know I normally leave this out and dose K2SO4 for the potassium as the test kit says I have high nitrate, but yes I know there wrong now, thanks to your help, but just to be on the safe side I only added half, and will continue adding K2SO4 as I normally do, so now I should have extra nutrients in my solutions and I will continue to dose the full amount.


Safe side of what? I don't get this. Nitrogen is the Number 2 most important element and Potassium is down at Number 4, so I see no point in using half of the required dosages for N and increasing K. I have no idea what the toxic level of NO3 is in a tropical tank. I've dosed up to 100ppm without issues. London Dragon made a miscalculation and did 10X EI dosing for a while before realizing his error. That means he was dosing around 200ppm. Whatever the toxic value is for NO3 we won't get anywhere near it. If you have high NO3 because you are not cleaning the tank, then that is a different story entirely, but even in that case, the damage is being done by the dirt. The NO3 is merely the smoking gun that happens afterwards.

Furthermore, If you have GSA and if it's suspected that it is due to low PO4, then you need to be adding a lot more PO4. This is another reason the extra K2SO4 addition is so perplexing. The more you fear nutrients the more problems you will have because the tank is obviously screaming for more PO4 and you are putting in extra K, which can make the plant demand even more PO4.

In picture #1 above you need to thin out that bed and redistribute the plants. This opens up flow/distribution within the bed and helps the plant to recover. Continue to remove all damaged leaves.

Some algal forms are more resistant to blackout. It's not clear why. It might be due to higher levels of starch reserves or it may be more complicated than that. No dissolved gas affects the behavior of any other gas dissolved in that same water, so there is no point thinking about killing BBA with Oxygen. During water change, you can spot treat using Hydrogen peroxide, or Sodium perchlorate ( a better option) or spot treat with Excel the remove the BBA from hardscape.



Jafooli said:


> I will also continue to work on my CO2 diffusion and monitor it everyday to see how stable it is, and if its still un-stable I will order a new FE and see if that fixes it. If I start the week at 1BPS, and at the end of the weeks its 1.3BPS, what kind of problems would I expect to hit? more algae? BBA? or is .3 an acceptable fluctuation?


 Well, I really don't think that looking at the bubble rates is the way to approach this. You really need to focus more on the pH profile throughout the day and to look deeper into the reasons for any anomalies you find. It may be that the small variations in bubble rate have little effect.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers for the reply, 

I can see exactly where your coming from about the NO3 and I do apologise, I have no idea why I fear it, even though I trust exactly what your saying, just before purchasing my first ever tank I got a little bit into keeping Koi in my pond, and all I ever heard being repeated was remove as much Nitrate as you can even if you can get it 10-20ppm which was impossible for me to achieve in my pond, obviously I now know my test kit is inaccurate, but its just annoying, I don't know, its stupid really like you say. I can only presume it is fear and that's another reason I had to ask you how high does have to be to become toxic. I am running low on K2SO4 and I will take your advice and I will add the full amount of KNO3 to my mix. Sorry if it sounds like I wasn't listening, but I am taking in everything, and I guess its annoying especially for me when I hear how people control there nitrates as if its life or death, for example Koi keepers, and say shrimp keepers. I know shrimp may be a different story, but Koi are surely more hardier than tropical fish, and then again these test kits are totally wrong in the first place, I guess its harder for me when I'm the guy with the high readings and not the low readings that 9/10 people seem to get when I look at there results and I can't get my head around the calibrating thing. I will listen though and I will add the KNO3, the full amount as I know I am cleaning my filters, tank, so the readings have to be wrong.

I can only presume the GSA is because of low PO4 as you mentioned it can be combination of low PO4 and low co2, but I would more say its due to low PO4 which the CO2 exposed. 

Cheers for the tip on the Glosso, I will be honest and say I have no idea what I am doing with it, I look at the plant in Google images, it seems to grow low, and spreads a nice carpet, I know mine will grow up towards the light, but how do I plant or spread this plant, I see hardly no roots, I can't really identify any runners. I will do some research on it and see how to propagate it.  

I will have a browse around and see how I take the PH approach to measuring CO2 stability, once again I'm still learning, I could ask you 1000's of questions but I don't want to annoy you lol. I know my PH has dropped about 1 by the CO2, I presume I just monitor it through out the day for any changes to get an idea of the consistency of the CO2, then again PH is not easiest thing to tell by the API colour chart.


----------



## ceg4048

Jafooli said:


> I can see exactly where your coming from about the NO3 and I do apologise, I have no idea why I fear it, even though I trust exactly what your saying,


I know exactly what you mean. A long time ago I also felt the same way. The fact is that just like Neo, we were all born into bondage. Programmed by The Matrix and  placed in a prison that we cannot taste or touch or see.....a prison for our minds.

Pond owners have more trouble with algae than anyone else, and they fear NO3 the most. That should tell you something. As you've realized, fear of NO3 is what created your problems and is what started this thread in the first place.

PO4 is easy to fix. Just add double and forget about it.

The fact that you are having nutrient issues as well as leggy growth on your glosso is also a strong indicator of poor flow/distribution.

All you have to do is measure the pH at 30 minute or 1 hour intervals from just before the gas comes on until lights off. The we look at the data and see where we can improve if needed.

I never bother with the liquid pH indicators any more. Instead of wasting money of NO3/PO4 test kits, which are useless, it would be better to spend it on a digital pH probe which is easy to use and which gives instant and more accurate results.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers Clive for understanding, well the good news is I don't care to much about it now so I will add the full dose of KNO3, and then I won't even need K2SO4. I've read a lot of people in the London areas use K2SO4 because of high NO3, I guess them people are still in the Matrix lol and believe what there test kit say. Don't get me wrong I would still like to know my exact nitrate level, If I knew a way to find out exactly 100% what my nitrate is, It would be nice to know even though I guess it would have no importance, but would be handy for my girlfriend who keeps shrimp, and I now know there inaccurate so If people ask about her shrimp water I can't give them a correct ppm.

I'm the kind of person that wants to try and understand everything, aka how things work, how there made etc, but I have to accept I'm just not that intelligent which is annoying especially as 2 years ago when I looked at a fish tank, I would never have thought there is so much going on which you just can't see, I bet thousands of people have no idea, a bit like me lol, but curiosity has opened this all up to me and the fact I want to understand what's best for plants, fish etc, so yeah I should of listened in science.

When I first learnt about EI dosing I wanted to know well how much of this and that should I be using, I know the point of EI is to provide more than enough, but how much is to much etc and how are people making there calculations, and I never really found them answers, only that there are dosing calculators and ppm ranges you should aim for. Now I just try to study the plants and see what I'm missing from learning or looking at plant deficiency diagrams as I believe I'm in the ppm ranges. For example when I first started EI dosing someone said they understood it all when they looked here: Concentrations of Stuff vs Time and Plant Uptake using The Estimative Index I have no idea what to even do on that page, graphs ain't my strong point and I don't get how that figures out nutrient uptakes, it's not even calculating a certain nutrient and surely we now know each tank will be different, as light, co2, flow has to be put in the calculation.

Anyway back on topic I hope you can just clear these last quick questions up then I think you've pretty much answered my questions on this particular thread, and I really do appreciate the time you have taken to help me, it takes me about an hour to reply lol.

You say:


ceg4048 said:


> you are putting in extra K, which can make the plant demand even more PO4.


 
Can I ask why would putting extra K in then make the plant want more PO4? would this pattern be the same with other nutrients? I presume there is a link somewhere which leads me on to my next question.



ceg4048 said:


> Nitrogen is the Number 2 most important element and Potassium is down at Number 4


 
Where can I find the order for this? it would be interesting to know.

Also you say:



ceg4048 said:


> As you've realized, fear of NO3 is what created your problems and is what started this thread in the first place.


 
I just want to be honest and say I'm not sure if I've 100% realized why that's what made me start the thread, because I presumed the issue was I injected to much CO2, which then exposed some deficiencies mainly PO4 because of the GSA, but in the first pictures I posted was the plants showing a NO3 deficiency then? sorry If I've totally missed something, I now know NO3 is the 2nd most important element, but I presumed I had some in my tank already from the tap water, I now know Its not as high as what my test kit says hence why I will add the full amount from now on, but do you think my tank was suffering from the NO3 then? if so how would I notice this? This is what I use as a reference to detect any issues: http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/rr121/CRSFan/PlantDeficiencyDiagram.jpg

Thanks again Clive, and also if you could give me an idea how much a digital PH probe would cost? I had a quick look on Ebay, and they seemed quite expensive, but it said they connect to a PH meter, so I'm totally lost, but will do some research, but for now I'm have to hope I've fixed the main issues, and hopefully what you taught me can give me a better chance achieving healthy growth.

I will also sort out my Glosso, and other plants and try make it so the flow can work around the plants better, I presume when a carpet is achieved properly the flow can go across the top and the leafs then take in what they need, in my case, there growing up and everywhere in a panic to find that nice flow combined with the fact they probably would like some higher par.

Can I also ask why does algae grow on the plants when they lack a nutrient I know there are various algae's so I can understand its different for each one and there are other factors for different algae's rather than just nutrients but take GSA for example, is it like a illness to the plant? It's strange how a plant can be healthy growing, but then get algae to grow on it's old leafs and not the new leafs etc. does the nutrient kill the algae? or when a plant is at full health it can combat the algae? I know the algae is always present, but for example does the lack of PO4 somehow make the algae conditions right to grow on the leaf? that would make sense why a healthy plant which has plenty of access to PO4 can combat it but our tank glass cant as its not an organism so it still grows on the glass even if there is a good amount PO4 in our water? sorry if that's another dumb question. I confused my self on this one as-well lol.

Thanks again.


----------



## ceg4048

Jafooli said:


> Can I also ask why does algae grow on the plants when they lack a nutrient


Poor nutrition means that the chemical products that plants use to stay healthy, to resist environmental stresses and to defend themselves against parasites and predators, will not be available. Nitrogen is used in almost every enzyme or protein. So if it's in short supply then the plant cannot produce a variety of proteins and enzymes. Whatever job these proteins and enzymes perform is accomplished less effectively under a low Nitrogen condition, if the plant manages to accomplish the job at all.

Also, structure breaks down, especially in the case of Carbon malnutrition. So cells rupture and they leach out their contents into the water column. Fats, sugars, even nutrients. Algal spores are always sitting right on top of the plant. Spore are everywhere in the tank and if they can sense the failing condition of the leaf by processing this information about the movement of chemicals across the leaf then they know it's time to attack the weakened leaf.

So, for example the cuticle of the leaf is a waxy material that moves and grows across the leaf. This prevents algae from adhering to the surface. Under nutrient or CO2 deprivation the cuticle material is lost and the leaf cell membrane is exposed to direct attack.

It's not clear what all the factors are, but there is a general correlation between the missing nutrient and the type of algae that is able to take advantage and establish a foothold. It might be that the composition of the contents being spilled out of the leaf tissue is different under different nutrient failure.

For pH probes, at the higher end of the budget are products like Hanna HI-98127 Ph probe. This might go for about £80.






For an additional £50 I would spring for their pH/TDS/Temperature probe, the HI-98129. This is what I have.





I did look at Amazon and there are some less expensive units like Hanna Instruments HI-99104 Educational pH Tester, 0.00 to 14.00 pH Measuring Range, +/-0.02 pH Accuracy, 0.01 pH Resolution: Amazon.co.uk: DIY & Tools
You also have to buy the calibration solutions, which does add to the cost slightly but these are still of great value. No more mixing stupid vials or running out of indicator solutions, or trying to read zany color charts.



Jafooli said:


> but do you think my tank was suffering from the NO3 then? if so how would I notice this? This is what I use as a reference to detect any issues: http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/rr121/CRSFan/PlantDeficiencyDiagram.jpg


Well, mate, you're looking at a troubleshooting list for terrestrial plants. That has nothing to do with aquatic plants, although some symptoms are similar. Also, different species show different symptoms under the same conditions. We just have some general rules of thumb based on what we observe in aquariums, not based on what an apple farmer, for example would observe.

If a plant has multiple deficiencies then it will  typically show only one limitation at a time and it's not easy to predict. I can predict though that if you had been dosing the correct EI values and not paying attention to NO3 test kit readings then you might not have encountered a problem when you increased the CO2, or the symptoms would not have been as severe.

That's why I'm saying that the root cause of peoples problems in a planted tank fundamentally is born in fear of nutrients. It was because of this fear of what it might do to fish that you restricted the Nitrogen levels. This made the tank susceptible to nutrient shortfalls when the CO2 was increased, because increased CO2 increased the need for more nutrients and they were unavailable at the time they were needed.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Thanks Clive again for the information, definitely is interesting to learn, I'm glad I asked now... also regarding the digital PH readers there a bit out my price range for now, so may have to wait till later in the year, I hope its not going to be a make or break decision regarding my tank and CO2 stability. Hopefully we have fixed the worst, and now I can continue to improve in other areas as-well.

Cheers again for all your help, I've been reading numerous threads you've posted in, so am learning a bit of this and that, and will make another thread sometime if I can't solve any other problems I may have in the future, I know I am also having a hard time regarding flow, I've seen how you do your tank with the spray bars and how you have recommended other people, I see most advice is to go from the back to the front of the tank and then the flow goes down the glass and over the substrate, I sadly have 2x internal u4's my flow has to go long ways, which you did say is also ideal but one would need more power in there output's etc, the only issue I have with going long ways is all my stem plants at the back are getting bent from where the flow is hitting them, there's not much I can do about it, where with your tank and other members the flow is hitting the front of your tanks then going down, with mine its just bending every plant at the back, how ever I do get good flow distribution around the tank, but its not very natural looking. I cant position the filters at the front either so I can't go front to back long ways, so yeah I could not find much advice out there for internal filters, only spray bar positioning. I will keep doing some research, and if not I can always go ahead and make a new thread, other wise this one would go on for ever, and I don't know the thread rules so I don't want to go off topic here.

Thanks again, I've learnt a lot in this thread


----------



## Maximum

Thank you for this thread, I have only lurked but have learnt a great deal. I am thinking of pressurised CO2 later this year so all the information has been very useful.


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## Jafooli

Looks like I'm back again, I think I've already found the problem even though we did briefly mention about immature tanks at the beginning which I was convinced was not the issue but I have noticed the return of this brown algae diatom mess which so far is only infecting the glass, now I thought about it, and the only thing left which it could be is if my tank somehow had Ammonia, as we covered everything else, I never thought my tank would of had Ammonia, my fish have been fine, even my most sensitive fish, but either way .....

I did an Ammonia test and to my surprise my Ammonia was 0.25, my tank should be more than able to cope with my stocking level, and I know it can, because it has been fine, but I do know I've changed my routine in the last month or so, and that's that I now clean all my sponges each week to try keep the tank as clean as possible as I read a clean tank, filter keeps algae away as-well. I can only presume this has been lowering my beneficial bacteria levels to much as I don't overfeed. 

Can you please advise on what's the best method for me to clean my filter sponges, I have 4 sponges in total , 2 in each filter, and I have 4 Poly carbon filter cartridges, once again 2 in each filter, these are the most dirty each week, and seem to attract most of the mulm. I probably only use to clean 2 sponges every 2 weeks and would rotate which 2 I cleaned.

My normal cleaning routine on all the sponges/poly carbon is to remove them from the filter, stick them in a bucket of aquarium water I've just removed, and with my thumb gentle clean as much dirt off, and with the sponges I also give them a gentle squeeze. I can only presume doing all of this on all the sponges etc is lowering my beneficial bacteria to low.

I hope you can help, as I don't want to be in a no win situation aka if I don't clean them as much I will get some other algae.

So maybe I should just clean 2 sponges and 2 poly carbon pads each week? even more gentle than what I already do? I would be interested to know what you do and what you recommend I should do. My tank is pretty inhabited, so I'm pretty stuck, or I am just cleaning them to good / often.

I feel stupid for asking in a way, but I know I've upped my cleaning on the filters, and maybe I'm being to precise with it all, but how does everyone else on here do there filters and how often and do they do all there sponges, as I don't think my biomax alone can handle my tank's bioload.

Thanks in advance.


----------



## ceg4048

Hi,
       I keep trying to convince you to stop testing because test kits cannot help you. It's probable that you are not even aware of what the number is actually telling you, even if it were accurate, which is a lottery. If the NH3 level in the tank was 0.25ppm  then the fish would not have survived even for a week. When you have a problem in a tank, the very last thing you need to do is to whip out a test kit. Nitrogen testing is a very difficult thing to do, and at the hobby grade level, the data returned by the kit are useless.

So the test kit lies to you, you then misinterpret the lie and then contemplate changes to your procedures that may be completely irrelevant. This results in "serial misinterpretations" as you will jump from one conclusion to the next, all based on an original lie. Your filter cleaning procedure was never an issue. Why should it be a problem all of a sudden?

Depending on pressures and temperatures, aqueous ammonia exists in different phases, such as vapor phase and liquid phase as well as having various ratios of NH3/NH4+.  The fact that CO2 is also in the water at the time complicates things even further because there are some indirect reactions between the two. Depending on the maturation of the tank and the various enzymes available in water or sediment, NH3/NH4+ combine with different products to form some stable and unstable compounds, so it's very difficult for the test reagents to record accurately what is in the water at any one moment.

Look at the data presented in the post http://ukaps.org/forum/threads/your...scale-ammonia-and-nitrites.21965/#post-224903 and see that the numbers reported by the kit, or by your interpretation just don't make any sense.

Just continue to do large water changes, use lots of elbow grease to clean all surfaces, dose nutrients immediately afterwards and reduce the lighting intensity if possible. You can also do what I call a "soft blackout" by not turning on the lights in the tank for a few days. After a while it will not return.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Dam I just got my head around inaccurate nitrate test kits, and now I'm being told its even the ammonia test kit's lol, so I can presume all of the test kits are pretty useless, what about the PH kits? is that why you recommended I get a digiital ph reader for more accuracy, rather than the silly colour charts which are hard to match anyway at the best of times, regarding PH.

I don't think I'm ever going to understand or learn all of this, but I just hope that won't make me a failure in achieving a healthy planted tank.

While I now fully respect all these test kits are now wrong, I guess they can still be used as a reference? aka when I've cycled both my tanks they did read high Ammonia levels, now I know from that thread well the bits I could understand, is that the test kit was probably reading higher than the real value and other things are going on, but I guess its safe to say for people who do use the kits, when they get around the 0.25 there tank is pretty much ready to go or even at higher levels as mentioned in the thread different things are going on and different things effect the reading, but I guess it can help people through the cycle period?

I hope you can appreciate its hard for me to dicept all of this information mainly because I now know the tests are wrong and I'm a person who wants to know my water parameters lol, for example, I am currently cycling my girlfriend's tank as I just put some Ebi Gold in there, now people on here who look after shrimp would probably go crazy if they had a reading of 0.25 ammonia, so if I said that to people on the shrimp section I had ammonia they would be like you need fix that etc, same as Koi keepers.. I guess its best to just use your eyes and let the fish/shrimp do the talking, I guess I can now safely say its 0ppm unless everything starts dying regarding my tank.

I guess the best test I can do is go with my own experience on regarding the fish behaviour.

As mentioned art the beginning of the thread I presumed my tank was fine with 0 ammonia as all fish look in great health, there is no erratic swimming, flashing, darting, anything, I did the test got that result, and I'm glad my question didn't turn out to be that stupid in the end lol, I now know the result was false.

I've bookmarked the thread and will go over it a couple more times to take in as much as I can, looks like I will up my water changes and will try a soft black out, I cant reduce light intensity as the lights are built in on a hood which sits on the fluval roma tank, would reducing the photoperiod help at all? my photoperiod is 9 hours at the moment, should I go down to about 7 hours for couple of weeks after I've done a soft black out for few days or will that not help at all?

I guess I can still be worried if the Ammonia does keep climbing though, but like I said I will just use my experience with my fish and they can let me know if problems do appear rather than a test that can't be trusted, and I will continue my normal filter cleaning routine. 

Thanks again.

Also to add quickly you say:  





ceg4048 said:


> dose nutrients immediately afterwards



I thought I would ask, you mean after the water change just dose my Macro nutrients ? or do you mean dose my Macro and Micro together?

The reason I ask is because it sounds like you mean add them all in at once, I normally dose the Macro, Micro on alternative days, and Saturday is the rest day. I always presumed they cant be added at once?


----------



## ceg4048

Just follow you normal routine for dosing. I mentioned that so that you wouldn't forget to dose after the extra water changes.

Any of the nutrient test kits are flawed. This includes Iron, ANY Nitrogen kit and especially PO4 kits  (which no one actually knows what they measure). Kits that measure things like KH/GH/pH are OK, but again, most people have no idea what these parameters mean. They are just hypnotized  into attempting to keep some arbitrary number which someone assumes is good. I suggested the probe because they are easier to read and are more accurate, assuming you calibrate them regularly. If a £40 probe is out of your budget, then how do justify spending all that money for the test kits that you have and will continue to spend money on. Just add up how much you have spent on NH3/NO3/NO2/GH/Ph/KH  and compare that to the price of the probe.

You're fooling yourself when you decide to follow the policy of "...the kit is inaccurate but their readings are useful as a reference...". That idea has no value because the "reference" is a fantasy as explained in ferts causing high nitrate! | UK Aquatic Plant Society

You really need to forget about controlling parameters because that's really not what determines success. Keeping your tank clean and free of organic waste is the best policy generally. If you intend to breed then numbers like TDS, GH and so forth are relevant.

The water changes reduce the level of toxins in the water. It's as simple as that. You don't need to measure anything. Just change as much water as possible. People only think they are in control. They focus on the wrong things and they make life more complicated for themselves. Then they have problems and they blame the problems on nitrates.

When you stop worrying and stop testing, do the basic things like keeping the tank meticulously clean, you will find that you enjoy your tank more and it will be less stressful and more successful.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers Clive,

I get the message clear and loud now, I just thought it was the Nitrate tests and didn't realize it's all of them, I will also purchase a PH probe in the future when I get some spare cash, I hardly use the test kits so they do last me a long time, they were mainly for the pond and cycling my tanks, but now I know there all false anyway so yeah no chance of a refund is there lol.

I will stop testing and I will keep things clean and will concentrate on enjoying my tank!, just hate this diatom mess, but hopefully it will just disappear soon like you said. I also mentioned how I cant lower my light intensity, I see diatom issues can be due to light as-well but I presumed this wouldn't be my case as my par values are not even in the low light section of the graph that you have linked me before, I'm running 2x T8's at 18inches, my par was just on the graph its self just under the low light section. So I would be shocked if the light was the cause but I'm not the expert. Would reducing my light period an hour or 2 help speed up the process of removing the diatoms if somehow the light is the cause. I will also be doing a soft black out as you recommended.

I also just wanted to ask you some questions which I hope you will have the time to answer for me or put me in the right direction, also if you can still keep it simple for me to understand that would be great as-well.

1.


ceg4048 said:


> If you intend to breed then numbers like TDS, GH and so forth are relevant.


I don't want to become a hobbyist focused in breeding, as I've not got the room for numerous amount of tanks to separate fish species and set tanks up with the correct conditions.
However when selecting my fish I chose fish which have been bred in a planted aquarium, without human intervention.

I've asked you before and I know GH/KH, TDS is nothing to worry about, that's fine, but I have read articles on here, such as "All about Water Hardness | UK Aquatic Plant Society"
I understand some of it, and while I cant boil buckets of water worth, or go down the RO route for now, how else can someone reduce there GH/KH TDS?
Am I correct in saying the ferts we dose in the aquarium can raise GH? I also know our ferts can raise TDS.
KH I'm not sure about out.

So these fish I selected, is it more challenging for people to breed when they dose fertilizers if the fish requires softer water?

If it helps the fish I am going to use in my tank for example is   Trigonostigma espei &#8211; Lambchop Rasbora &mdash; Seriously Fish

I've seen these fish courtship with one another, but have never seen them lay eggs under any leafs or do any practice runs.

Other fishes I've picked, Panda Cory, Zebra Danio, Rummy Nose

Zebra danio: Apparently one of the easiest, while I have also seen these spawning around the tank in the morning light, I've yet to see eggs for my self, and I'm thinking maybe if there is eggs there not fertile from my water hardness.

2. In the same house my girlfriends tank, has a GH and KH much lower than mine, her TDS use to be 300, no ferts in this tank could explain why, its a Shrmp tank which we have had no success with.
In the invert section we have gotten great help, and we have purchased some Ebi Gold substrate, its already reduced the TDS to 180 and getting lower, I have not tested the GH and KH as of yet, but we are expecting them to very low, as the substrate apparently buffers them values along with PH. Her GH and KH in her old substrate was 12GH, 6 KH, hopefully we will aim to half them values, even so 12GH and 6KH is way lower than my tank and yet in the same house, once again ferts? eco complete? raising mine.

How does a substrate lower GH, KH? I have not read that in the article above I posted, we also said maybe my Eco Complete has raised mine, so maybe its not the ferts in my tank and its the Eco Complete.

I just thought it would be interesting if you could explain some of that to me, and I think I would learn another good chunk of information, also to mention I'm still getting my head around
(A multivalent cation is a positively charged ion with two or more positive charges, ie, Ca++, Mg++, Al+++, Fe+++) so I am still learning some of that, as some have more + then others, and some have - , science wasn't my best friend that's why I said I hope you can keep it simple lol. I get the concept of the equation, just have no clue what's happening in my tank water.

Sorry for the long essay, I hope these questions don't bore you, last final question quickly about these silly test kits:

3. My girlfriends tank read 1 Ammonia, I did the test after substrate was in for few hours, but don't worry I now know there pointless and inaccurate, but I need some advice on this one, how can I know when the tank is safe for inhabitants ?

I have 3 otto's and 1 Cherry shrimp in there, they would be dead this morning if it was 1ppm or 0.25 as you said, I presume 0.25 they would be dead, especially a shrimp, while he was a bit on deaths door after the first couple hours he has perked up now, so what is this kit reading? I will go back through the article you linked me which does explain it reads numerous things, and acidic and alkaline conditions all play apart, but how does one know when a tank is cycled ? or in my case when will it be safe to add shrimp, I did keep the filter alive so that should help.

4. How long can a filter survive a power cut? I've been lucky so far and not had one in the 2 years of owning my tank unless I missed one.

Thanks again, and sorry for the extra questions (essay) but as you said GH/KH are fairly important for breeding, and I did read lots of articles so I did try, but just couldn't find the answers, some of it did get complicated.
I see the article you mention about fish being played the hand they were dealt, and soft water fish can live in hard water, like plants can adapt. But how come they do not adapt to breeding as-well as adapting to the water conditions? I do think my water is to hard in my tank. So hope your answers can help me a bit, but If it came down to it I would rather have hard water and healthy plants rather than no dosing, soft water and breeding fish. Unless I had 2 tanks.


----------



## ceg4048

Jafooli said:


> I understand some of it, and while I cant boil buckets of water worth, or go down the RO route for now, how else can someone reduce there GH/KH TDS?


Hi mate,
             Really, there are only a few ways to remove these dissolved ions, RO, an exchange resin such as what household  water softeners use, and boiling.



Jafooli said:


> Am I correct in saying the ferts we dose in the aquarium can raise GH? I also know our ferts can raise TDS. KH I'm not sure about out.


GH is just the water's content of Calcium and Magnesium. If you add these as part of your dosing then you will raise GH. KH is the water's content of carbonate and bicarbonate. If you are not adding any of these the the KH will not increase, however, KH test kits do not measure carbonate hardness, they measure the alkalinity of the water, which is a much more generic, and is just the water's content of those anions which can buffer any acid in the water. Anions are molecules or atoms which have a negative charge. Bicarbonate (HCO3-) has a negative 1 (-1) charge.

Anything that's dissolved in the water  raises the TDS. That includes liquids even though the acronym means Total Dissolved Solids. So adding nutrients, food or hardscape that dissolves will raise the TDS.



Jafooli said:


> So these fish I selected, is it more challenging for people to breed when they dose fertilizers if the fish requires softer water?


But it's also a lot harder to breed when the fish are not well fed with plenty of live food, when the water is not clean, when the lighting is too high, when the temperature is not right. I mean, there are a lot of things which contribute to fish breeding. Breeding has nothing to do with NO3 levels or ferts generally. There are plenty of people out there who are not able to breed their fish and they have neither plants nor do they add ferts. I've bred dwarf chiclids in an EI fed tank. Look at this post (this is the fellow who invented EI) EI dosing impact on fish breeding and Fry | UK Aquatic Plant Society



Jafooli said:


> How does a substrate lower GH, KH? I have not read that in the article above I posted, we also said maybe my Eco Complete has raised mine, so maybe its not the ferts in my tank and its the Eco Complete.


Do you have any of those little magnets that you use to post notes on your refrigerator? Well, just think of the substrate as the fridge door and the ions as the magnets. The substrate attracts and holds the charged particles. At some point, maybe a few months, there are as many magnets on the door as it can hold and the TDS starts to rise again because they remain in the water instead of being trapped on the surface of the sediment particles.




Jafooli said:


> 3. My girlfriends tank read 1 Ammonia, I did the test after substrate was in for few hours, but don't worry I now know there pointless and inaccurate, but I need some advice on this one, how can I know when the tank is safe for inhabitants ?




Depending on what's in the tank, that material may or may not attract these charged particles. On the other side of the ledger, if you have hardscape in the tank that is made of a soluble material, then the material dissolves, especially if there is CO2 in the water which generates acid. The dissolved material raises the TDS. If the material contains Calcium/Magnesium the GH will rise. If the material contains Carbonate or other alkaline substance then the KH will rise.




Jafooli said:


> I just thought it would be interesting if you could explain some of that to me, and I think I would learn another good chunk of information, also to mention I'm still getting my head around
> (A multivalent cation is a positively charged ion with two or more positive charges, ie, Ca++, Mg++, Al+++, Fe+++) so I am still learning some of that, as some have more + then others, and some have - , science wasn't my best friend that's why I said I hope you can keep it simple lol. I get the concept of the equation, just have no clue what's happening in my tank water.



Here's a short primer about atoms:
Atoms are constructed of a nucleus which contains positively (+) charged particles called Protons. The value we ascribe to the proton charge is just +1, so, if there are two protons together then they have a combined net charge of +2. The protons also are made of smaller pieces (quarks) which have another property called the "color" charge. The color charge is about 1000X stronger than the electric charge we're talking about but it is only active out to about 0.000000000000001 of a meter, so as long as the protons aren't pulled apart then they are held tightly, and the electric charge, that wants to repel away from the other proton is too weak. That's why protons are squished together inside the nucleus. If you smash those protons with a tiny billiard ball, the protons will go flying off away from each other and in so doing will release a lot of energy. That's how atomic bombs work.


 
On the other hand, although the protons are locked together, the electrons are free to move about, and they have plenty of energy, but they have a -1 electric charge and so they are attracted to the positive charge of the protons in the nucleus. They also repel each other so they are in constant motion trying to get away and being attracted at the same time.

In this picture above can you see that there are 2 protons in the center and 2 electrons on the periphery? If you sum up all the charges you'll get -2 and +2, so the net charge is zero and the atom as a whole is considered neutral. If some force were to pull one of those electrons away then the atom would have a net positive charge (+1) because there would be -1 and +2. This atom will then be called an ION, and since it is a positive charge it would then be called a "catION".

So now this ion becomes an active agent and it would roam around with it's +1 electric charge looking to attract any electron. In this particular case, the atom with 2 protons is Helium. In that orbital circuit there can exist only 2 electrons. As a result Helium is not a very active atom and it's not easy at all to pull any of the electrons from their orbit. Helium therefore is considered inert.

Lets look at Hydrogen. It is the first element ever to exist and it's the most abundant in the universe. All that you are  started with this little atom. As you can see it has only one electron and one proton. However, that orbital "shell" that the electron inhabits can hold two electrons, so even though the atom is neutral, it is very easy to fill that shell with a second electron, and, conversely it turns out that it's very easy to pull that single electron away. When that happens there will be this single proton floating about, again, with a powerful attraction and on the look out for electrons. This is called acid. Don't play with it!


 

More often than not, two hydrogen atoms find each other and share electrons.
As I mentioned, that first "shell" can hold 2 electrons so in the figure below, if we could animate the image, we would see both electrons (blue) circling around in a figure 8 around one proton then another. These shells, or orbital locations, being the outermost from the nucleus are called the "valence" shell and perhaps the name valence comes from the outermost visible valence of a curtain or drapery. When the electrons move around BOTH centers in this figure 8 pattern, the bond between the two atoms is referred to as "co-valent".


 

As more and more protons are forced together they capture more electrons and the situation becomes more complicated.
There are more electrons and they have to space themselves so that they avoid each other. This creates more "shells". Check this image out:


 
On the right you can see Carbon. It has 6 protons in the center, and, of course, as a neutral atom, it has 6 electrons flying around it. You can see that there is a second shell. The first, inner shell has all the electrons it can hold (2) but the second shell, the outermost "valence" shell, having much more space and being much further away from the center, can hold 8 electrons. So it doesn't mind sharing an additional 4 electrons. So now look at what happens. In each of the five atoms, the maximum of 2 electrons fills the first shell. On the Carbon atom you can see that the maximum of 8 electrons fills this outer shell.




So, chemical reactions are all about the movement of electrons because the electrons carry energy and can satisfy the attractive properties of charged ions.
Look at Calcium, but avoid hypnosis: The inner shell is filled with 2, the second and third shell are both filled with 8 and there are two electrons on the perimeter. When Calcium becomes ionized, it loses these two electrons and therefore will have a +2 charge. This is a similar story with all metals. They have a very low population of electrons in the valence shells and those electrons are so far away from the center that they are not held very tightly, plus they have a lot of energy. The movement of electrons in metals is therefore VERY easy and that's why metals are great conductors of electricity. 


 




Jafooli said:


> 3. My girlfriends tank read 1 Ammonia, I did the test after substrate was in for few hours, but don't worry I now know there pointless and inaccurate, but I need some advice on this one, how can I know when the tank is safe for inhabitants ?


I just take care of the tank, feed the plants and do frequent (2X-3X per week) water changes. Wait 6-8 weeks. Add critters. It's so simple, it's automatic. People fret and go through a lot of hand wring for something that is so simple. That's hw long it takes to mature a tank.




Jafooli said:


> 4. How long can a filter survive a power cut? I've been lucky so far and not had one in the 2 years of owning my tank unless I missed one.


If you have a power cut just disconnect you filter and open the top. Maybe lift out a tray every now and again to get some air in there. I don't have any trouble when there is a power cut. Again, it's much ado about nothing.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Hey Clive,

Thanks for all the information, especially the "short primer about atoms" still seems a lot to take in lol, but I can see you've tried to make it simple for me, I definitely understand some of it, but will have to keep reading it over and over till its stored away. I really appreciate that.

You definitely covered everything there for me so cheers, I still need to read the breeding thread you linked so I will be sure to give that a good read.

Also if I remember correctly I do add a lot of Magnesium sulphate, when compared to a EI dosing calculator. To be honest I just stuck to the paper sent from APF one of the forums sponsors about the EI starter kit, but when I tried to learn how much of things I was dosing which I did learn, the Magnesium sulphate was on the high side but still in the PPM ranges, but I would like to make my own dosing tbh, but my scales went bust, I realized they was not accurate. I'm half hearted on my dosing mix, I trust APF guidelines would be accurate enough, but when I do get some scales I will probably try make my own mix, even though its EI which is meant to be easy so I'm sure any persons mix is just as good as the next persons.

I was going to make my own mix at one time, until I noticed my scales were inaccurate, I saw on this site Yet Another Nutrient Calculator when you hit DIY mix, it says "The estimative index" or "EI Daily", once again if I remember correct because this was like last year both of them options still put me in the ppm ranges, but the EI daily would not put me in the ppm ranges until the end of the week, where as the ""The estimative index" put me in the ppm ranges straight away.

Example KNO3

EI daily gives you 3.20ppm Nitrate with your fist dose, that's not in the range with the first dose.
The estimative index will put you at 7.50 on the first dose!!! so yeah its a bit complicated there, but the way I see its EI and either one would work. But yeah which option is best as you mentioned a while back adding more of something then makes the plant want more of something else, so that got me thinking a bit, and now especially as Magnesium can raise GH.

I don't want to drive you crazy with my EI mix, as its EI, and the point of it is to just provide excess nutrients, but the benefit of my own mix is I know exactly what I am adding, rather than using a bit of paper saying add 10ml to every 50 litre's and telling me how many teaspoons of KNO3 to add to 500ml of water etc. This also may lower my GH if I do my own mix, as mentioned above about the Magnesium sulphate, they say add 6tsp, I can't remember exact now but when my scales worked I weighed the grams, put them in the calculator and I was at the high end off the PPM range on the first dose, so some of this could be the underlining problem to my GH/KH, but I'm not sure what works best. (I'm also not sure if I'm adding any carbonate and bicarbonate)

I'm also looking into getting some extra cash and purchasing this PH meter, It has good reviews and the calibration solutions 4&7 can be purchased with it, I hope its not that hard to calibrate it etc.
High Quality Waterproof pH+Temperature Meter Tester: Amazon.co.uk: Electronics




ceg4048 said:


> At some point, maybe a few months, there are as many magnets on the door as it can hold and the TDS starts to rise again because they remain in the water instead of being trapped on the surface of the sediment particles.



I hope the Ebi Gold substrate lasts a bit longer than a few months, or I hope the TDS don't rise to much then the GH/KH/PH etc will probably rise as-well if it don't buffer for a long period.

Thanks again for your information! I will definitely try to absorb it all into my brain lol.


----------



## ceg4048

The pH meter you linked to should be fine. As I mentioned, you should also buy the calibration fluid.

EI is meant to be interactive. There are no laws against using your own numbers. If you are using tap water and if the municipal supplier has a report that shows Mg then you do not need to add any more Epsom salt. All you have to do is to monitor the tank to check for deficiencies.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Thanks Clive for all your help, I've definitely learnt a lot and will need to re-read some things just to make sure I take it all in.

I also do think I need to make my own Macro mix, if I can get the GH down it would be nice even though its not needed, but why keep it that high when I can bring it down without effecting the plants and It would also bring down TDS etc which all in all may or may not benefit my fish with there breeding attempts, the thread you posted about breeding fish in EI, even there his GH,KH was way lower than mine.

If I do make my own mix like you said above, deficiencies will be the key to getting it right, but hopefully I will get it right first go. I'm also not sure if anything I'm adding contains carbonate and bicarbonate I need to do some research there.

When I do get some scales I plan to use the dosing calculator I linked above, and will probably just start the lower dose "EI daily" and see how my plants respond over a couple of weeks and if any decencies appear I will know what to add etc or I could then just make a new mix with the higher ""The estimative index" on the calculator.

I also can't tell you my Mg numbers I'm afraid, I've just spent about an hour searching everywhere for my water report, all though I have found it its not very detailed, they decided to not list Calcium and Magnesium, its just a "no limit set" apparently there "Non regulatory parameters" or something, so I may email them.

I live in the South East of England, in Kent, and we're pretty much covered with chalk and limestone not literally lol, just behind me I have a chalk quarry, our water is real hard, if the calcium is coming from the chalk could explain my high GH, but then again it was lower in my girlfriends tank, "same house" so could be high magnesium dosing.

In there words:
Calcium no limit set
Occurs naturally and comes from chalk and limestone rocks that form a large
part of our area. Calcium is one of the main substances that contributes to the
hardness of water.

Actually the more I read, everything I dose in my Macro they give the "no limit set" apart from Nitrate they give me 50 mg NO3/I
"http://www.southeastwater.co.uk/media/116347/Water_Quality_Explained_SEW.pdf"

Can I just ask when I do email them and ask for the magnesium level, if they said it was like 0.5mgl, I did 0.5 x 200 litres, gives 100ppm lol, now I know that ain't right,
Somewhere I've gone totally wrong, as even "50 mg NO3/I" would be 50 x 200 = 10000ppm, I hope you don't fall of your seat , as I know that's ridiculous, but *how do I work out the ppm in my tank of something shown on the water report *so I don't look stupid, the key they gave was this:

The main chemical measurements:
1 mg/l (one milligram per litre) represents one part per million.
1 µg/l (one microgram per litre) represents one part per thousand million.

Hope you can just clear that up for me, then I can leave you in peace lol, thanks again for all the above help, now I just need to wait for the diatoms to go.


----------



## Jafooli

Oh wait maybe the 50x200 is actually 50 milligram's per litre like it says lol, BUT its *10000 milligrams of NO3 not 10000ppm *so 10000 milligrams of NO3 in my tank gives me 30.66ppm of NO3 in a 200 litre tank.
I feel so dumb so all along ppm is just the milligram per litre of nutrient's/chemicals in our tanks. I have so much to learn =\ but I think I learnt that one my self. I hope I'm correct there.

So if they told me I have 0.5mgl of Magnesium in my tap water that would be 0.05 ppm which sound's to low, so maybe my estimate of 0.5 is not correct. But I think I understand it now.

I just x the milligrams per litre by 200, then on the dosing calculator input my milligrams on a 200 litre tank, and that will tell me the result of my dose.

If I am correct, then that just shows how all along before I knew nitrate kits were inaccurate I generally believed I had night nitrate, but this method is just more prove of how inaccurate they are.
My tank wields 30.66ppm of nitrate. I just used my pond for example as-well 4546 litres x 50mgl of NO3 = 227300 milligrams, that gives me a nitrate of 30.66ppm as-well.

Well I think I answered my own question, probably easier ways to do it, but please let me know If I am totally wrong. I think I'm wrong a bit through, as why would my water company put epsom salt in there water supply lol, so the caculator is using epsom salt rather than the magnesium my water company use or the rocks its coming from, so that's the flaw =\ dam.


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## ceg4048

Hi mate,
                 I guess I'm really not sure why all the calculations. A mg/L is exactly the same as a ppm.  They explained all that in the first line: There is no need to calculate any further.



Jafooli said:


> The main chemical measurements:
> 1 mg/l (one milligram per litre) represents one part per million.
> 1 µg/l (one microgram per litre) represents one part per thousand million.



This is exactly what I mean by people misunderstanding basic facts and becoming hysterical.

The European limit for NO3 in municipal water supply is 50ppm. There are no Euro limits for some of the other elements such as Calcium so maybe they don't measure it.

Kent water is high in Calcium, that's true, but it's worth asking them what the Mg level is.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Hmm its real confusing to me I have no idea, 50mg/l says my water report for NO3, that would mean 50mg/l x 200 litres = 10000ppm which is impossible.
But if I use the "one milligram per litre" like they also say in the same sentence, it gives me 10000 milligrams.

10000 milligrams here Yet Another Nutrient Calculator gives me 30.66 nitrate, sounds more correct to me, so that's where I'm confused... how can milligram and ppm be the same then?

If the facts are right, then what am I doing wrong, my tank is 200 litres, so surely the sum is 50x200 as its 50ppm per litre? how else can I work it out.

I need to know because if they tell me the Mg level, how am I going to determine how much my tank has.

I can see the fact, just cant see how to take the results, and then put them results into context of my tank.

Its either 10000ppm or 10000 milligrams = 30.66ppm. I have no idea how I'm misinterpreting this.
Unless the 50ppm just stays 50ppm across any given volume of water, 2 litres would then share the same NO3, still resulting in 50ppm.


----------



## Jafooli

Maybe I need to stop looking at that calculator, as KNO3 contains potassium NO3 alone is different, its probably the calculator that's drove my mind around the bend. 

I guess I can just presume that 50mg/l / 50ppm of NO3 is in my water supply, and 2 or even 10 litres is going to share the same NO3 as one litre would, so the result would just keep to 50ppm over any volume of water.
I hope the Mg in my water supply is a bit higher then 0.5ppm then =\


----------



## ceg4048

Jafooli said:


> Hmm its real confusing to me I have no idea, 50mg/l says my water report for NO3, that would mean 50mg/l x 200 litres = 10000ppm which is impossible.


No, somewhere along the line you have fallen off the wagon. 50mg/l x 200 litres = 10,000mg. 50mg/L is the same as 50ppm.

Did you ever play marbles as a kid? Way back when we'd all be on the lookout for a true "tiger eye" marble which was always prized. They were assumed to be one in a million. 
That means if you had 1 million marbles, then 999,999 of them were ordinary, and only one was a true tiger eye. That's what 1ppm means - one part in every million parts.
This is how we measure concentration. It's a ratio of the item that you are interested in to the number of items that you are NOT interested in. So when we state the concentration of NO3 or any other compound that is dissolved in the water we are stating the ratio of number of those molecules compared to the number of water molecules. 50ppm NO3 means that for every million molecules in the tap, or in the tank, 50 of them are NO3 and 999, 950 of them are water molecules. The calculations that you are doing, as far as I can see, will tell you the total number of NO3 or whatever is in a given volume of water - and that is a meaningless calculation because the number of NO3 molecules in that volume has to be considered within the context of how many water molecules there are in the tank. So now do the same calculation for 999,950ppm of water molecules and you'll see that the answer is very nearly 200 kilograms which is just about what 200L of water weighs. 
So all  50ppm means is that there are 50miligrams of NO3 dissolved in every kilogram of water. Each and every one of those 200 kilograms of the water will have 50mg of NO3 dissolved in it. 1mg is one millionth the weight of a kilogram. One liter of water weighs 1 kilogram.


 

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers Clive,

I reckon that calculator is what made me fall of the wagon,

Cheers for your explanation,

So 999,950ppm of water molecules I have in my litre of water, 50 of them NO3, I do the sum x200 I get 199990000 water molecules in my tank and the remaining 10000 molecules is NO3.

10000 molecules of NO3 divided over 200 litres is 50, which is the 50ppm we had all along. Half my sums I make up as I go along so bare with me, but I do understand your explanation and makes sense to me now.

I have no idea what happens when we go over a million, I presume as we are now out of parts per million because we ain't working out ratio's, we would then start to use weight if we wanted to weigh the milligrams of something but then different liquids would weigh different so lets keep to water. So 199990000 water molecules would be 199990000mg/l of water, which is nearly 200KG, chuck in the NO3 molecules as well and we get the 200000000 milligrams which is (200KG)

Sorry if that's hysterical again but trust me I do understand your equation now, I just presume one don't need to go over 1million ppm as we know exactly what's in the litre of water, depending on what we are looking for in our case NO3 which is 50ppm.

I guess the next complicated thing is taking the results, then putting them into plant food, if the water report is accurate I can now say my tap water contains 50ppm of NO3, so my tank consists of 50ppm nitrate, I would have no idea how much my plants use in a week, when I do my water change, I'm then putting 50ppm in again or is it because there is less no3 molecules in the tank due to the plants, so if I had 25ppm in my tank left, it gets confusing as 50ppm would then be spread out. See I have no idea on the next stage of this process. It don't really matter I guess as that's the point of EI, but would interesting to know, surely people who decide to leave something out, for example NO3, Magnesium, Iron etc that person would need to know the answer, unless they have one of those £3000 tests kit's I see you linked to someone before lol.


----------



## ceg4048

Jafooli said:


> See I have no idea on the next stage of this process.


The next stage is to forget about it and just follow the dosing program.



Jafooli said:


> It don't really matter I guess as that's the point of EI


Good. Now you're back on the wagon.



Jafooli said:


> surely people who decide to leave something out, for example NO3, Magnesium, Iron etc that person would need to know the answer


No. They never need to know the answer. If you do a 50% water change every week the nutrient level will never get larger than [tap water content + dosing level].
In this old post I did the calculations to show what the maximum level would be. Check it out if you're a masochist.
EI daily methods or PMDD + PO4 | Page 2 | UK Aquatic Plant Society

If they don't add iron and if the plants need iron then the plants will exhibit an iron deficiency. If they add more iron than the plant needs then the plants will just take what they want and ignore the rest.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers Clive, I'm going to let you be for now, as I'm probably draining your energy especially as I have no idea what I'm on about, I think you've helped me more than enough and you've definitely gone out your way to help. I will try to take everything I've learnt from this thread to better my self.

Lets just hope the main concern "the diatoms" will disappear for me in a couple of weeks or so 

That thread you linked was quite interesting, you could obviously tell that's the kind of information I was seeking, I understood the equation you gave about NO3.

You mentioned he didn't need to dose NO3 if his tap water was 40ppm or at least the baseline values, I tried to replicate the same equation with 50ppm from my tap water, so says my water report. I also presumed my plants take 20ppm a week for my equation, now on his equation you was adding +20ppm a week, I'm doing the opposite -20ppm a week, so I'm not convinced my equation is right. Long story short I never exceeded 60ppm and my peak was always 80ppm. Basically got the same as your equation.

I  started 50ppm-20ppm=30ppm/2=15ppm
15ppm+50ppm=65ppm-20ppm=45pmm/2=22.5ppm etc

I'm not sure if the equation works the same when your taking away NO3 rather than adding it, [tap water content + remainder in tank?]. I'm probably totally wrong once again, so there is no point me adding things like a rough estimate on production via nitrification into the equation if I'm not even on the correct path.

I can see exactly why you put this and I quote" Fretting over toxic nutrient levels in my opinion is a complete waste of time and it really sucks the energy and enjoyment out of the hobby."
Couldn't agree more, I guess when one knows there water report says 50ppm I just wanted to figure how much is in my tank, and then the equation you linked was what I was looking for, but it could be a different story when you add plant uptake into the equation, also just to add I'm actually not that too bothered about NO3, I just used that as a example from the beginning, my more concern was magnesium & GH as I would like it lower, but obviously as you told that guy if he had 40ppm in his tap water, he would then not need NO3 or at least he could dose it lower, so am a bit concerned now if I'm being honest. But I'm just going take your advice and enjoy my tank and add the NO3 anyway. I guess I will just keep an eye on fish, although I have sometimes seen "increase in gill rate" my fish would sometimes go down to the substrate in groups, but there gill rate would be high, and they would be gasping but not at the surface, I once did so much research into it, someone told me it could of been stray voltage, what a waste of time and money that was, I had no idea what I was doing but I gave up with that, anyway I only ever see that occasionally apart from that everything is fine, but if my equation is right, and take into account my high stocking level, so "production via nitrification" then my nitrate may have reached higher than 80-100ppm and into toxic levels.

I also noticed "EI DOSING USING DRY SALTS | UK Aquatic Plant Society" which looks interesting, so that may help when I start to make my own mix. 
I can't explain how much I envy them pictures and other people's tanks on here. I just can not see my self achieving such quality.
Light,CO2,Nutrients,Growth Rate, easier writing about it all but yet each one has so much depth no wonder its so hard to achieve perfection. That's why I feel like I need to ask all the questions, I just feel like my tank is not going to achieve such beauty.

Thanks again, If you want to confirm my equation is right or wrong, it would be nice to know, as it would make it easier for me when I do make my own mix.  Either way I'm take your advice about not worrying and start enjoying, and hopefully with time I will get a tank I'm proud to one day post on here. Cheers again for all your help!


----------



## ceg4048

Hi Jafooli,
                  Well, as I mentioned in that post, we have to make some assumptions and the last 2 assumptions were:
4) Assume zero NO3 uptake.
5) Assume zero NO3 production via nitrification.

We don't know these numbers and can never really measure them. They are of the same order of magnitude and tend to cancel each other out, so if you don't assume that the uptake is zero then you also should not assume that NO3 production from filter and sediment nitrification is zero. 

You also don't know that the tap has 50ppm. That number is just the Euro-limit and the value was measured at some location other than your house, so even that number is suspect.

It's because we have all these variables and uncertainties that it is pointless to worry about it, especially when we know that we are nowhere near the toxic levels.

I mean, seriously, just look at the abstract on this page  Studies on the toxicity of ammonia, nitrate and their mixtures to guppy fry 
You can buy the article if you want but the abstract on that page give you a pretty good idea. The parameter in the second sentence 72-h lc50 means that in 72 hours, 50% of the guppy fry died. 

Look at the numbers when they mixed ammonia and KNO3 together:
199ppm N from KNO3, which equates to about 875ppm NO3 + 1.26ppm N from NH3 which equates to about 1.5ppm ammonia. That's what it took to kill 50% of the guppy FRY in 3 days.

Imagine if they deleted the ammonia addition. The NO3 concentration required to kill the guppies would be an astronomical number. And that's FRY, the weakest and most vulnerable stage, not adults. You are nowhere near that and will never be.  Whatever you think you are seeing as distress in your fish has nothing to do with NO3. That's why it's a waste of time worrying about NO3. We should instead worry about ammonia because it's a couple hundred times more lethal. That's why frequent water changes prevent it's buildup and that's why planted tanks have an advantage.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers Clive,

I was trying to do the maths all night in my head, it drove me mad, I couldn't understand why NO3 would increase in my tank from my equation. If that was the case, I could fill a cup up, then another and say I have 100ppm of NO3 which is false as we know from above about NO3 molecules and water molecules, so it will just stay at 50ppm even if both cups were combined, but if one cup had 50ppm and the other 30ppm and we combined them it gets complicated for me as it can't be 80ppm. So doing a 50 w/c on my tank left with 30ppm, I have no idea why I was getting 65ppm. That's why I think my equation was wrong as surely it can't be more than the taps water supply unless the nitrification rate was much higher, but anyway like you've said above I guess we don't know the numbers and they can tend to cancel each other out. Its giving me a headache figuring that one out, I've learnt a lot above about ppm and the molecules, and will just call it day with this sum, either way its of no importance.

Thanks for the information about the guppy fry, I'm just going to continue focusing on the important factors and hopefully I will get to where I want to be, rather than wasting time estimating exact no3 levels etc.
When I do get some new scales and make my own mix I will just keep everything in the ppm ranges and if I get everything else correct, co2, flow etc and achieve healthy plants, then I could always start lowering things, such as MgSO4. Thanks for all your help.


----------



## ceg4048

Yeah, good plan mate. When you mix two equal amounts of water which each have different ppm values, the final ppm is just the average of the two, so it's 80ppm/2 = 40ppm.

Cheers,


----------



## Jafooli

Cheers, all along it was just the average. 

Thanks again now I fully understand.


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## Jafooli

Hey Clive,

Its been nearly a month since you helped me with my issues and I'm not quite winning the war yet.

I think I know much more than what I did, when I first opened this thread, and I now see your helping other people with the exact same problem! Brown algae!

So I think I've got mine to a point where the plants are not sure if there winning, and the brown algae is not sure if its winning either. It seems to be 50/50.

I know I got all my dosing right, I now am now not using CO2, so I hope I'm right in saying my tank is now more low tech. However I am using liquid carbon.
I'm not using pressurized CO2, just because my fish were not getting along with it, fish were dying, acting odd. It was more hassle then it was worth..
So now I am using liquid carbon and around 1/3 EI. I may use CO2 in the future when I can get this tank actually showing signs of growth and much more plant mass.

If anything surely the liquid carbon route gives me even more room for error. But I'm not sure. Anyway I hope you can help me, I'm not sure what you can tell me that you haven't already told me and everyone else.
But the main factors I think which contribute to diatoms, are:

To much light?
Immature Tank?

and GSA, is poor CO2 distribution / flow and low PO4.

I don't suffer GSA any more, even though in these pictures you may see a leaf or two with it, these are old leafs, which I never cut as I had already cut nearly all the plant from its worse infected with brown algae.

But I have not beat the brown algae, and I see some people spend up to a year battling it, and some even giving up on there tank.

Here are some pictures:

This is the glosso, I dug up and thinned out like you mentioned, its doing great. I could not remove the infected leafs as its such a delicate plant. I spread it out, and its bouncing back real good. Much more fresh green growth, and seems to be doing great, all though the picture don't do it justice.

http://oi57.tinypic.com/35komkn.jpg

Here is my stauro repens: In this picture you can see the 3 leafs on the right on the plant, the bottom one is really infected, this is probably a few weeks back, the second leaf would have then been new growth that got infected, and then the third leaf the same procedure, you can see each leaf has got less brown algae, this is what I mean by the algae is not as bad no more, it's effecting the plants not as much, but still imo killing the plant / leaf slowly. As you can see with the new growth my main problem is brown edges on the new leafs.

http://oi62.tinypic.com/15gch3m.jpg

Here is another picture of a plant I'm trying to save (Wisteria), it was the fastest grower in my tank, this is all that remains. This shows how severe the brown algae currently is, so obviously not as bad as what it has been, but its stopping the plant growing, if it does grow it produces a tiny leaf.

http://oi58.tinypic.com/jkvfw9.jpg

Here is a picture of my Echinodorus, this seems to be a continuous pattern with this particular Echinodorus, its eats its self alive:

http://oi58.tinypic.com/oa6jxx.jpg

Here is a picture of my other Echinodorus: (the total opposite is happening, this plant is currently putting out one of the healthiest leafs in the tank, I've never seen it so red.

http://oi62.tinypic.com/14jb6o1.jpg

It can't be due to flow, as the other Echinodorus is in a real high flow area, where as the last one don't get as much flow, but enough to make it sway, also you can see the old infected leafs with GSA and diatoms.

So I've done so many things, I have changed flow, changed CO2 diffusion and distribution, to where now I've removed it and gone more low tech, so now plants should use less nutrients, as liquid carbon is not as prolific as gas CO2, I also am sure flow is getting everywhere, so the liquid carbon should be getting everywhere, its about the 5th day of using liquid carbon. How long will it take my plants to adjust? I've also done many cuttings on these plants, so there probably still rooting into position. I even gone out and purchased new plants to try and give them the edge, as like I say I feel like I'm balancing on a wall, and I don't want to fall the wrong way and be back to dead plants. When I purchased some new plants I was real shocked to see how green they are compared to my plants in the tank. Here is a picture:

http://oi60.tinypic.com/24njxpz.jpg

The hygrophila on the left is the new one, and the crypt on the right behind the rummynose is also new. Interesting enough you can already see both these plants leafs yellowing, why are they yellowing?
I dose enough KNO3? I also dose enough Ca and Mg from what I know, the hygrophila which is yellower is also in my girlfriends tank, same house, no dosing etc, and its greener, all her plants are greener, her stauro repens is dark green, her mosses are greener than grass. So I'm confused. If you have already mentioned things which I've forgotten or not read back on then I apologise but I don't see why I have deficiencies still, but from what I can see I've took everything I think you taught me and cant figure out how to kill this brown algae, and also get my plants thriving. They are growing so slow, and each leaf they produce is tiny.

Here is a tank shot also: http://oi61.tinypic.com/54xj0i.jpg

So if you can give me some more options step by step or something, or anything from these pictures you can see is a major issue, or something is missing.

Once again I am adding everything, I've just literally started 1/3 of EI this week, so today was the first time I have not dosed, I dosed Macro Sunday, Micro Monday, and was going dose again Wednesday, Thursday just to get a bit extra in the tank. How long does it take for plants to get use to a new environment? I see plants take time to adjust to there CO2 surroundings. So is there a chance my tank is fixed, and I need to just wait? I also still do 50% water change a week. My fish seem much better now I am using liquid carbon. I am using 5ml for 200 litre. It should be 4, but I have chose 5 and in a month or so hopefully get to double dose, but liquid carbon don't kill diatoms, so I need to keep trying things.

I hate this brown algae, I know your helping a lot of other people with it as well. I just cant see it being my lights, flow I honestly think its right, I know your probably say its not, I just don't know what else I can do, I never had this issue before even when I had only one filter, this seems to be a new thing that's just entered my tank. I think I've got my dosing right. CO2 is not a issue, I now use liquid carbon. I'm sure its distribution is good. If the flow was any more powerful the plants won't stay in the substrate, even though I cant improve it no more. Its swaying everything, and I've seen youtube videos where people's tank are heavily planted and some plants are not even moving.

My light period is 11 till 8, my girlfriends is 12 till 5, should I go to 5 hours? her tank is suffering no brown algae, I thought it may be something in the water from all the floods the UK had? I don't think that's the issue though, but why is this thing so tuff? I don't want to keep doing black outs, its obviously still coming back but much less aggressive now. I've got about another £20-£30 I could spend on plants, but today I thought I aint going to spend that just encase they all die, I see my new plants already yellowing. I also got a tiger lotus I am hoping that would out compete with algae as-well, I am just trying to focus on growing plants, even if I have to go real low tech. How can I eliminate this stuff. All google tells me is to remove silicates, which ain't even the cause I think you have proved. So what more can I keep doing? or do I need to wait for everything to adjust? if everything don't die by then? I'm thinking literally daily water changes of around 40% for a week might be a good approach but I don't want to ruin my tanks eco system.

Sorry for the essay, I know a lot of other people are suffering the same thing, but as everything in my tank is low tech, surely I should be able to beat this easier.


----------



## ian_m

Jafooli said:


> I'm right in saying my tank is now more low tech. However I am using liquid carbon.


High tech if adding carbon, so back to full EI dosing and light control or else algae farming will dominate your tank.


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## Jafooli

Hey Ian

Cheers for the reply, I gather I am still high tech, but not sure how to mention I'm also low tech, I don't know how people refer to it.

I have low light anyway, so my tank is never going to be high tech even with CO2, but I presume high tech is classed as CO2 injection.

I have only not dosed today, and that's because last week I spent hours trying figure out do I dose fully or not, from what I read on Tom barr's hybrid dosing, with excel. Is to use around 1/3 and carry on with water changes but if one wishes they can lower down water changes and lower the excel till they have to do nothing, and then they also can lower dosing even less than 1/3, and only dose when plants need. I don't want to go that real low tech, but he mentions for faster growth rates you can continue excel and keep dosing low with water changes or no water changes.

I'm confused why with carbon I need to carry on full EI dosing, I thought it was like 25% less effective, and as my lights are low, and the liquid carbon is less effective, I can lower my ferts? I also see many people with liquid carbon do 1/3 EI with no algae issues. Also liquid carbon is good at killing certain algae?

So would be interested to know what I should be doing? But in regards to my real issue the brown algae, Full EI with liquid carbon or not full EI, this problem is not going away.

Is there anything I can add to the tank like salt? I heard diatoms don't like salt...  or any other chemical that will remove this from my tank, like mentioned above I have followed Clive's advice, other threads, I can't see why its hard to defeat, and I'm not the only one who is finding it difficult. If anyone wants to correct me with my low light I keep referring to its: 2x 30w T8 Bulbs at 18inches above substrate and about 7 months old or even more. When I checked the parr thread I was not even in the low light I also read I don't need replace lights till they die, and I also had been fine previously. Ammonia is 0, even though any test results I give are pointless as you cant trust there results. So my tank is not immature either. If it were my light then that's crazy.... its a Fluval Roma, all you need to do is research that tank and plants, and people are taking there light unit apart as its such a rubbish light, everyone does DIY on it and upgrades it to a T5 unit, do they then go on to face diatoms? not from all the Fluval roma plant growers I see, and I've seen a couple on here. So I'm confused on what causes diatoms... silicates is a myth.. so can't see what else I can do... I don't think I'm being naive in saying I don't think its due to light, flow, immature tank. As I have done so much research and I don't think I'm alone with this brown diatoms algae mess. I don't mind stopping with my liquid carbon, and going real low tech, and stopping water changes and dosing all together, like my girlfriends tank. But I still don't think that's going to solve the issue. Its like a disease that I cant get rid off.  No wonder people strip there tanks from it.


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## ceg4048

Yeah, I agree with Ian. Any time you enrich carbon it's automatically high tech. While you're correct in saying the liquid delivers less CO2 than gas, all that means is that now you may have issues associated with not enough CO2. Just adding the liquid means nothing if you're not adding enough. You may need to add 2X or 3X the bottle suggestion, and of course that will have it's own toxicity issues. 

So it's not really clear where you are with this issue if you randomly decide to use fractional dosing of nutrients and fractional application of carbon. That's why people struggle for months, because they apply arbitrary numbers like that. 

If you're still getting GSA then this says immediately that there is still some combination of poor CO2 and poor PO4. If you're still getting yellowing then of course it means there is not enough NO3 or Mg/Fe.

So you have to dose the standard amounts because we have no barometer that measures how much CO2 is being used or how much demand for nutrients there is.

When you withdraw the gas injection the plant health will take an immediate nosedive and will take weeks to recover if you have not also withdrawn some light.

Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Cheers Clive,

Well then I am more confused than ever, what more can I do?

Like I said only today have I missed my Macro dose, this problem did not appear today... my dosing is exactly to your dry powder dosing guide, and I don't have 6 WPG!
I also am not using fractional application of carbon, I am using what everyone else and aqua essentials say to use. 5ml per 250 litres, I am using 5ml just to get a bit extra in the tank, and I am monitoring fish health, its only been 5 days, I will slowly increase till 2x the standard dose. Why do I need to increase to 3x or even 4-5x, that don't make sense to me.

My light drives my tank, the CO2 is then next, I have low light so the power of my tanks force is quite low, this means from what I know, CO2 uptake will not be as much along with nutrient uptake, compared to a 6WPG tank, so I am not dosing 4ml and then 8ml liquid carbon one day, I am keeping it stable at 5ml, and will slowly get to double dose. So not sure why I am going to struggle?

I also am not getting GSA on any new growth, just brown edges and a light mist of brown algae then takes over the leaf like seen in the pictures.

So from what I gather my plants are going to take a nosedive, I can understand that, as that confirms what you have taught me and what I've read in your other threads, and numerous articles. So after a few weeks once they have programmed there selfs for my CO2 levels, then maybe I will see less diatoms?

I cant see what's wrong with using 2x the Standard dose of liquid carbon, if that's more than enough for my plants, and its dosed each day. Why will I have issues? what's the point of liquid carbon. Its not another money scam like test kits is it? I just want a low tech tank, with some carbon to get those extra growth rates like Tom barr mentions. If I put my liquid carbon in the bin, then what do I do? how do I remove brown algae.

Sorry guys I just cant get seem to get this right, its really frustrating me out now. I understand the Light, CO2, nutrient demand. Double dose should be more than enough, its not fractional, and if I do full EI there should be more than enough nutrients.

Regarding the yellowing? how much EI should I add then? I am already doing the guidelines, and probably a tad higher. Should I do 5x the amount EI? even though I don't have 30WPG.

Cheers for the help.


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## ceg4048

I guess I'm also confused because you just stated that you're dosing 1/3 EI. That's a fraction. You also state that you turned off your CO2, so compared to what you were injecting prior, what you are dosing now is fractional. I have not seen any data that confirms your lighting to be low. Only a PAR meter or the PAR charts give information on that.

GSA is caused by any combination of poor CO2 and poor PO4, so there can be no doubt that there is an issue with either or both. It doesn't really matter what anyone else is using or suggesting as far as dosages are concerned. It only matters what the plants are saying.

Withdrawal of CO2 is not a simple affair. CO2 is like a narcotic, so when you reduce the level the plants suffer symptoms.

Cheers,


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## EnderUK

The steps of a Roma owner.
1. Get Roma
2. Decide on planted tank, reads that you need t5 for planted tank. Wished they got the Rio instead.
3. Hacks the roma to fit t5 spending £50+
4. Either ruins hood and has to pay an extra £100+ for new hood or succeeds and is now running very high light for the tank and all the issues that come with that.
5. Joins UKAPS and finds out they wasted their time and money.

If you want to hack up hood apart I can tell you what I did. but you really really don't need to.


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## Jafooli

Oh ok, I didn't know we were both confused. I didn't realize I was dosing a fraction. I just presumed from the hours of research I did that its normal guidelines (standard) to dose 1/3 of EI when using liquid carbon.
I presumed it was easier for Tom Barr and other people just to say 1/3 rather than giving dosage calculations. So I just presumed 1/3 of EI with Excel is the standard amount.

If I were using pressurized CO2 then did 1/3 then I could see where your coming from, but looks like I got it wrong, so all along the answer I was seeking is with Excel you use the full amount of EI, and I won't be wasting even more amounts. Which counteracts what I've learnt.

I will go back to full EI then, I just presumed your dry powder guide was for people using pressurized CO2, and the nutrient estimates given were done on a tank of 6WPG.

I also thought a tank with low par, will have less CO2 uptake, and therefore less nutrient uptake. I have no idea why I was thinking all these things, I obviously do not understand it correctly.
I actually thought since I had lower light, I have more room for error regarding CO2 uptake and nutrient uptake, but it seems like these two things increase when you have lower light.

I also am not suffering GSA, but am suffering brown algae, (diatoms) unless GSA is a diatom I'm so confused. http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/algae.htm This says there two different things?

My whole issue is brown algae, its killing my tank, its like a wildfire destroying everything it touches, and new growth is just dying still.

I also thought now I'm not using CO2, and am using liquid carbon, the plants might take some time to adjust, but they should thank me for it still, as at least I'm giving them there drug, maybe not in the amount they want, but its better then none? I cant understand how people with no CO2, don't get GSA or brown algae then?

Tbh its depressing me out now, I thought I understood it all:  Light>CO2>Nutrients>Organic waste, but I'm totally wrong. I think I'm just take it all out and buy fake plants, at least I can wash them easily every week. Its a shame as I've had great success before, but looks like I cant defeat what I can't understand, and I've seen many people fall from brown algae, looks like I'm another. I will never understand how a aquarium in the same house, (my girlfriends who knows nothing) has a better tank with healthy plants than mine, and I'm the one who has spent hours reading articles etc, and the end result looks laughable.

Thanks EndlerUK, I actually don't want to upgrade my lighting, as you mentioned in the steps, I did exactly that, I learnt about DIY CO2, on my fluval roma 90, I read T8's dont grow nothing, I managed to get a massive jungle scape with t8's!. I then got confident enough in my ability I grew carpeting plants with T8's I then learnt from Clives articles and others you can grow any plant in nearly any light and it can grow, if given the things it needs.

I actually like my T8's because once again from what I read I should have much more room for error, and the whole process should be easy, this is what I am trying say about the low tech - high tech I am in the middle as my light demand is much lower compared to a roma with T5's.... I should not be having these issues.

Here is my old Roma: 

Around 8 months ago I upgraded to a 200, I didn't care about the lights, I was picking low light plants, spending a fotune on Eco Complete, regulator, FE, nutrients, the result at first was good, and now a dead tank.
The best tank I ever had was a tank with DIY co2 with yeast, so unstable CO2, powders I had no idea did what, but I chucked them in, I did hardly no water changes and did it when ever I wanted, and yet all I have learnt is to fail.

Thanks again though for everyone's help on this forum, I obviously can't understand it all properly, I think I'm stick to looking after my girlfriends shrimp, if I can even get that right. I cant see what more I can do. I have took and followed everyone's advice, but I'm still doing something wrong. Sorry if I sound rude above or anything, its annoying. I thought I understood the basics, and cant see why dosing Excel would be a issue. My issue was brown algae and back then I was using pressurized CO2. 

I appreciate everyone's help though, and will just keep browsing, especially in the algae section where other people are also facing brown algae, and hopefully someone will find a solution.


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## ceg4048

Jafooli, the thing you need to understand is that there is a range of acceptable CO2 and within that range there is another range of acceptable nutrient levels. Both of those ranges sit within a range of lighting. This is not a lift where you press a button to go to a specific floor. We really have no way of know exactly what the nutrient demand is, or what the actual CO2 uptake is. We only know the approximate ranges and we depend on the plants to tell us whether we are within the range or not. Algae and poor growth tell us that we are below the acceptable range. Even so, there are other factors which affect where we are with respect to the acceptable range, such as flow/distribution, temperature, dissolution techniques and so forth.

There is no point comparing what success you had before versus the lack of success you have now, because sometimes you have good luck and sometimes not. There are so many factors, and people make so many assumptions when they have good luck, then they carry those assumption over to the next attempt and the starts don't align, so things go awry.

As I told you, liquid carbon does not deliver the same amount of CO2 to the plants as gas injection does. I cannot tell you exactly what the numbers are but their is a significant difference. So just because someone had good luck using so many mils of the product, it cannot automatically mean that you will have good luck using the same dosages. That would be as if someone told you to use a certain bubble rate just because they had good luck with that rate. You have to determine what bubble rate works for you.

There are good reasons why a yeast CO2 would work well if you are lucky, however, most yeast users are NOT lucky and they have all sorts of problems specifically due to the instability issues. That's why they switch to cylinder, but just switching doesn't automatically guarantee good luck.

And just because you have more room for error it does not mean that you can make unlimited amounts of error. You can still have problems even when you have more room for error. That's why we say to use the basic numbers and make adjustments from there. What you did was to make a whole lot of assumptions that culminated in an error that was outside your margin, large as it was. Adding CO2 changes the fundamental mechanism of plant metabolism. Removing CO2 has just as significant a change. AS far as I can recall, all these problems started when you changed the CO2. When CO2 delivery changes problems occur.

Here is a example of an assumption:


Jafooli said:


> I will go back to full EI then, I just presumed your dry powder guide was for people using pressurized CO2, and the nutrient estimates given were done on a tank of 6WPG.


So the guide was prepared prior to the popularity of Excel and as I said, Excel does not produce as much CO2 as gas injection, but there is no data that says you can automatically deduct 2/3rds of the dosing when using Excel. Very few people use 6wpg, and those that do have all kinds of problems because their tanks are not as efficient as the guy who did use 6wpg and who developed EI. Folks using EI do get problems as a result of flow/distribution and CO2 anomalies. The more light being used and the bigger the tank, the easier it is to use up the margin for error. Many come to the realization that the tank will have problems with very high lighting unless everything else is perfect. In most tanks everything else is NOT perfect, so the margins for error is quickly used up. Dose the standard numbers and let the plants tell you when you can use less.


This can be a type of GSA. If it wipes off easily then it's diatomic. If you can't wipe it off then it's GSA.





Cheers,


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## Jafooli

Cheers Clive,

I will try keep this short and non complicated lol.



ceg4048 said:


> Jafooli, the thing you need to understand is that there is a range of acceptable CO2 and within that range there is another range of acceptable nutrient levels. Both of those ranges sit within a range of lighting.



The quote above is pretty much what I already understood, so theoretically two people with identical tank's, same flow, same plants, everything the same. One tank has low par say T8's and the other has T5's and say medium par. The guy with the T8's his acceptable CO2 range to the plants will be lower and his acceptable nutrient levels should be lower. The guy with T5's his margin for error is less as the metabolism of his plants will be higher due to the higher light, so if both were injecting the same CO2, and nutrients, you would see the deficiencies in the T5 tank first presuming he was not providing enough. This stuff I already think I understand pretty well, but maybe I am thinking it all wrong still. I more than understand each tank is different and there is plant mass, flow, height from substrate, many factors all playing a role, but still this leads me to my next part:



ceg4048 said:


> Adding CO2 changes the fundamental mechanism of plant metabolism.



So Darrel another expert on here he uses the duckweed index, and many other people also. They helped me a while back and said I could go down that road, and I won't even need CO2, as our tank gets about 1ppm of CO2 from gas exchange and that's enough for the plants, however growth will be very slow, and as we know nutrient uptake will be less also. So this is pretty much as low tech as it comes. I don't want to go that low tech.

Now if I had a low tech tank like these guys and then I said I want more growth rates, I'm go set up a pressurized CO2 system and go full EI, its going to take my plants a couple of weeks to get use to the change, and slowly there metabolism will increase when the plant makes the fundamental changes. I know you have spoke about the plants before and how they carry the CO2 etc, and you have to match there needs each day or the system collapses.

So the point I am trying to make is, surely most plants can grow in our tanks with out CO2 injection, but it will take time. Now in my eyes, compared to members on here. I for sure am in the low light section, so I think I am correct in saying, my CO2 acceptable range and nutrient range will be much lower, if I managed to get max CO2 levels in this tank, the plants can only use as much as the light will allow them to use. Surely they will reach a point where to use more CO2, nutrients, they will need more par.

So I've removed my CO2, as it was causing stress, toxicity issues with my fish, and I don't want to go real low tech like mentioned above. So I purchased some liquid carbon, now the problem I am going to have is my plants metabolism is high, as its grown up with high CO2 levels, well I wouldn't say that but its had access to CO2 GAS, my plants are now just getting Excel, 25% less effective, I have no idea what my CO2 levels were previously, but my plants now need to adjust to the new range? surely this can be accomplished? I mean if I stopped all CO2 and didn't even use Excel, surely in weeks time, the plants will have adapted to the 1ppm of CO2 from the surface, there nutrient uptake will be lower, growth will be slower, but they will still grow, and algae shouldn't appear as everyone with low tech would have algae, as long as the plants are healthy they should defend off the algae.

So what I am thinking in my head and trying to say is, why should I have issues?

I have low light, my flow and distribution is great imo, my plants might be taking a nosedive, all though I can't see how they were all dying anyway from diatoms, so now there going to have adapt to my liquid carbon levels, even if that's 8 or 16ppm liquid carbon, surely if I keep providing the nutrients, eventually the plants will adapt to this?

If not then I will just bin the liquid carbon, and do what Darrel does and just stick to 1ppm CO2, add nutrients when needed, the growth will be much slower, but I can't see why adding a constant value of liquid carbon will not give me better results, just not as good results compared to someone with GAS CO2.

So I hope you can confirm some the above for me, because if I am totally wrong about all this, then I need to know before I face more issues.

Also I believe I don't have green spot algae, I have had this in the past, and its still on some leafs in the photo's, I normally just cut them leafs, and Its only ever been about 1 or 2 leafs to each plant. But I've not noticed none appearing for a while. My main problem is brown algae. I can tell you now it comes of the plants, I have removed about 50% of plant mass from my tank, my clothes and towel was covered in brown smudgy stuff. When I rub it off leafs, you can see it dilute into the water. I've rubbed and scrubbed, the brown algae (diatoms) are not as prolific as what they were, but my plants are not growing at all, if they are its tiny amounts, new growth is still getting diatoms on the outter edges and eventually all over. How can I stop these diatoms? I have done all your advice, It cant be because of light? I have also just reduced my light now to 12 till 6 as I can't reduce intensity, even though surely intensity cant be that high!!!? I also am sure my tank is mature... so I have no idea what to do from here. I read threads where people have been battling it for months or even up to a year, or the point they give up and start again.

I hope you can put me back on track again, and I hope most of the stuff I have mentioned is close enough to being correct, other wise I've spent like a year learning, and have learnt hardly anything.
Surely I can grow plants if that be 1ppm CO2, like the duckweed index, or if its 9ppm from carbon, or if its 30ppm pressurised CO2, surely if I let the plants adapt, give them the nutrients, the flow / distribution, and if everything is in acceptable ranges.. I should get a planted tank with minimum issues?

Cheers again Clive.


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## ian_m

Jafooli said:


> getting diatoms on the outter edges and eventually all over


I get this on plants I have moved from emmersed growing to in tank full CO2 growing, especially at the bottom of the tank furthest from the light. Otto's help in removing some of it (but generally ignore it). It is indicating the leaves are dying due to their sudden change in CO2 circumstances 400ppm air to 30ppm tank, leaching nutrients into the water feeding the algae. All new growth is fine and green no sign of algae, so I just trim away the old stuff.

So your plants will be dying as you have moved away from unknown gaseous CO2 levels, to slightly more known liquid carbon levels (and different carbon uptake method) thus your plants will/may take a while to adjust, dying and leaching "algae food" until they adjust to their new surrounding. This is why consistent steady CO2 levels is such a major requirement.

Is you filter adequately removing water born diatoms. When I got "new tank syndrome" diatoms I put temporary floss in the filter, to attempt to take them out. Rinsed floss before replanting and water change and then cleaned floss afterwards in order to get as much as possible out the tank. I assume you are doing water changes ?, weekly with high-tech tank.

One thing to watch with Excel (and other liquid carbons) is it will melt some plants, even at low doing levels. I dosed Excel as well as CO2. The plants either get used to it and recover, like all the remaining plants I have left in my tank or just melted away to nothing despite only 1/2 dosing Excel.


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## Jafooli

Thanks Ian.

I was getting this diatom stuff when I was also using pressurized CO2 but this has only started at max a month ago....I had noticed the CO2 was increasing on its own accord, I noticed deficiencies appearing, made this thread. Lowered my CO2 as it went really high and fish were also stressed, + lower CO2, less nutrient demand....I also improved CO2 distribution, improved my dosing, improved tank flow. Pretty much stepped up my game thanks to Clive. I removed all the infected plants, but it still keeps returning but like I say not as prolific, but its still covering the plants.

I presume from what you have mentioned the diatoms may have appeared due to the increasing and decreasing in CO2. I'm not sure. If what you say is correct then I guess that's how they have appeared. Only my plants have not come from emmersed as they have been in the tank since the start.

I kind of need a new plan of action, or find out what's causing the diatoms. If it is because of the reason above which you mention, then surely each week my tank should improve, which it is doing. BUT.. plants are still hardly growing, diatoms are still there and still winning, but its much less severe as it was.

I do water changes each week, Before I made this thread I reckon I was doing about 40%, I only noticed when I checked my routine. I basically changed everything I do thanks to Clives help, I improved CO2, flow, I changed from liquid dosing EI to dry dosing. I now know exactly what I dose, and I now do 50% w/c a week. I guess removing all the infected plant mass made my CO2 level's rise in my tank, and it don't matter how low I injected CO2, fish were not acting right, even 3 hours in. I'm not after crazy growth rates, or pearling. I just want a nice steady tank that will grow that bit quicker than someone who injects no CO2 or liquid carbon. So I presumed liquid carbon is better than nothing. Maybe in the future once plants take off again, I will then look into pressurized CO2 again, but for now I want my plants to transition into there new environment, hopefully a more stable one now..... as so far fish seem much happier with liquid carbon. Like I say growth rates are not my main priority but I want it faster than pure low tech, so if my plants can adapt to say liquid carbon dosing, then I will be happy. Surely that's better than just giving them the 1ppm CO2 from say gas exchange, + I would then have to do less water changes, as I read when they adapt to the low tech approach, the CO2 increase from the water change can bring on algae and all type of problems. I want to stick to 50% water changes not only for my EI dosing, but for my fish health, and I read clown loaches should get about 50% water change a week aslo.

I have noticed my filters sponges are becoming more clean each week, I must admit they seem to be really brown when I squeeze the sponges so this could be diatoms on the sponges? or just extra mulm for some reason. 

Its interesting you say



ian_m said:


> water born diatoms



This is kind of what I feel when I look at my tank, this is what I am trying to also get across, I feel like light is not my problem, my tank is definitely not showing signs of excess ammonia or I can't see why it would of suddenly come immature. I feel like the tank is diseased, like its in the water... even if I remove all the new infected, next few days it will land on new growth. So I don't know, maybe it is the plants leeching the disease there self's? as there adjusting to the new environment. I don't know what symptoms plant's show when they change CO2 environment apart from what you have just mentioned which is what I am getting, all Clive said was they will nosedive, so maybe they do leech algae food, if diatoms are a algae?

There has to be something out there that can kill diatoms, I feel like my plants are just holding on, I have purchased new plants also, but I don't want to buy another £30 worth just encase they also die.

Also forgot to mention in my previous thread:



ceg4048 said:


> If you're still getting yellowing then of course it means there is not enough NO3 or Mg/Fe.



My water report says 50mg/l of Nitrate, I'm already being told in the invert section I'm have problems with my girlfriends shrimp with those readings from my water, even though we cant test Nitrate, so I have no clue what is really is... so that's already another matter I need to sort out for my girlfriend....

I add about 8ppm of KNO3, 3x a week into my tank, so lets say I do have 50mg/l or even 20mg/l 3x 8ppm of KNO3 should be more than enough?? I can't see the amount of plants I have using all of that, and like I say flow is good so imo they should be getting more than enough.. I don't mind adding more as we know it don't harm fauna, but not convinced its that.

Mg, we know I get a lot of that in my water as I'm from a area with chalk pits, etc, and apparently we get a lot of Mg, either way I am adding enough of that I think but I can't test my water, so that leaves Fe, Iron..which would be in my micro mix, I only add 1/4 2x a week, to help lower TDS as we talked about that before, the yellowing has always been in my tank even before I changed my dosing... so maybe I should go back to 3x micro a week, I'm just not sure which of the 3 it could be. How can my girlfriends plants in the same house be more green than mine? I know I got more plants, but yet again my tank has more water... I know I have a form of carbon so nutrient uptake is more, but plants are hardly growing so I am not convinced. Either way I will keep at full EI, and now with my liquid carbon levels hopefully uptake rate will be less than what it was, once my plants have made the appropriate changes.

Thanks again Ian for your help, I definitely do feel like this disease of diatoms is somehow in my water, and I'm not sure if a week of daily water changes at about 40% is going to do any good, it might ruin my eco system, I now also have a 6 hour photo period so that might help the plants in there transition, as it was 9 hours before.

( I also did ask if anyone has made a list of plants that melt due to carbon, but cant find any, my tank mostly has crypts, echinodorus, hygrophila's, stuaro repens, glosso, tiger lotus, java fern)
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