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Too much lighting vs wrong plants vs new tank?

That does sound reasonable. I was going to increase to fertiliser slowly (was planning for 1 pump daily for 2 weeks unless new issue) as I didn’t want extra nutrients causing algae. Do you think this hairy algae is because of lack of nutrients?
Thanks!
 
Thank you! I’ll just increase my fertiliser dosage then and see how it goes.
 
Hi all,

That is because you've added a nutrient that was <"limiting plant growth"> before the fertiliser addition. Algae can show a <"rapid response to nutrients">, because the ions will diffuse into each cell through the cell wall.

cheers Darrel
Ah that makes sense. So now that I have increased the dose of fertiliser should I expect a jump in algae initially but then it will plateau and hopefully eventually die off?
 
The dosage for a 318L tank would be a minimum of two pumps a day, and that’s still a pretty lean dose. I’d recommend doubling that for starters.
I’d also add the dose before your photo period, not afterwards. Your drop checker in the first set of photos appeared to be green. It ought to be yellow at lights on.
 
Hi all,
Ah that makes sense. So now that I have increased the dose of fertiliser should I expect a jump in algae initially but then it will plateau and hopefully eventually die off?
Yes, keep on adding the fertiliser, let the tank grow-in and manually remove any algae that bothers you.

The first thing to say is that we don't actually know <"what triggers, or sustains, algal growth">. I only keep low tech. tanks, and there definitely seems to be a relationship between high plant mass and less algae, but I don't know what comes first the chicken or the egg.

I also have snails and ~<"shrimps"> in all the tanks to perform <"janitorial duties"> and I'm pretty sure they are an important factor as well.

The main issue with the "Green Algae" is that they are in the same taxonomic grouping (<"Clade">) as all the higher plants and have the <"same basic physiology and photosystems">.

fig2-4-phylotreealgae-png.png

If you like they are all "plants" and conditions that favour one, also favour the others.

cheers Darrel
 
Thank you! I’ll just increase my fertiliser dosage then and see how it goes.

This table (courtesy of @Zeus. ) shows you the comparative contents of TSN vs full EI dosing.

1605698126306-png.png


You can see that the standard dose is less than 1/6th of the EI dose for most of the nutrients (less than 1/20th for Mg and K), so even doubling the standard Tropica dose doesn't really get you close to EI dosing for most of the nutrients. It really is just expensive slightly salted water. Even to get the NO3 to EI levels you'd have to do a 4x dose (9 pumps per day), and even then you'd still be under dosing the other elements at less than half EI dosing.

Long and short, its not really surprising that your plants might be struggling at half the recommended Tropica dose.

You are really best advised going for a dry salt starter pack on a tank your size, for best value longer term:

 
I’d also add the dose before your photo period, not afterwards. Your drop checker in the first set of photos appeared to be green. It ought to be yellow at lights on.

Ok thanks i'll change my dosing time to before the photoperiod. Yellow drop checker says its too much CO2 on the chart that came with the drop checker should it be a less dark green then and closer to yellow greenish?

Hi all,

Yes, keep on adding the fertiliser, let the tank grow-in and manually remove any algae that bothers you.

The first thing to say is that we don't actually know <"what triggers, or sustains, algal growth">. I only keep low tech. tanks, and there definitely seems to be a relationship between high plant mass and less algae, but I don't know what comes first the chicken or the egg.

I also have snails and ~<"shrimps"> in all the tanks to perform <"janitorial duties"> and I'm pretty sure they are an important factor as well.

The main issue with the "Green Algae" is that they are in the same taxonomic grouping (<"Clade">) as all the higher plants and have the <"same basic physiology and photosystems">.

fig2-4-phylotreealgae-png.png

If you like they are all "plants" and conditions that favour one, also favour the others.

cheers Darrel
Okay thanks i'm going to manually remove the algae now as it looks likes it's slightly worse than yesterday. i would say all of my soil is covered in plants now. Unfortunately my P helferi or the majority of them did not make it hence why there is a bit of empty space on the right of the aquascape. It just all melted when I put it in the tank and only 1/6 of the planted area came back strong and healthy.

I have been meaning on adding some clean up crew but my nitrogen cycle is not ready yet. I tested yesterday ammonia 0, nitrite 0.5 (improvement from last week where it was off the charts high). Nitrate is now around 40 from 5 last week. So i'm hoping next week can add some algae eaters.

Ah that makes sense regarding the tree diagram! Just need to outcompete the algae but tricky as they use same food as plants.
This table (courtesy of @Zeus. ) shows you the comparative contents of TSN vs full EI dosing.

1605698126306-png.png


You can see that the standard dose is less than 1/6th of the EI dose for most of the nutrients (less than 1/20th for Mg and K), so even doubling the standard Tropica dose doesn't really get you close to EI dosing for most of the nutrients. It really is just expensive slightly salted water. Even to get the NO3 to EI levels you'd have to do a 4x dose (9 pumps per day), and even then you'd still be under dosing the other elements at less than half EI dosing.

Long and short, its not really surprising that your plants might be struggling at half the recommended Tropica dose.

You are really best advised going for a dry salt starter pack on a tank your size, for best value longer term:


Thanks I did read the EI dosing information initially when I was looking at fertilisers but it looked so complicated hence why I went to the TSN for simplicity. It definitely does make sense though as if I am severely under dosing and I need to be giving much more fertilisers than I currently am so will be so expensive long term which isn't what i'm looking for. It still does look complicated lol but I guess I will just look into it slowly as I can just increase the TSN dosing for now.

Thanks for that link will definitely look into the dry dosing. Have you ever done it and is it really time consuming?
 
Thanks I did read the EI dosing information initially when I was looking at fertilisers but it looked so complicated hence why I went to the TSN for simplicity. It definitely does make sense though as if I am severely under dosing and I need to be giving much more fertilisers than I currently am so will be so expensive long term which isn't what i'm looking for. It still does look complicated lol but I guess I will just look into it slowly as I can just increase the TSN dosing for now.

Thanks for that link will definitely look into the dry dosing. Have you ever done it and is it really time consuming?

If you get that starter kit I linked to, its very easy and prescriptive. They send you the dosing bottles too, so you literally just spoon in the required teaspoons of salt from the provided bags, add some DI water, give it a shake, and you're literally done! It takes about 5 minutes. The bottles are dosing bottles too, so you only need to take the cap off, squeeze the bottle until the dosing section fills with the required dose volume, and pour it in the tank.
 
A second vote here for dry dosing. As a complete noob I started with it based on advice from this forum and it was super-easy. The thing I like about it is that I know exactly'what I'm putting in my tank. There's no mystery. And 9 months in with a lot more experience and learning it has been easy for me to tweak the ferts to account for my particular tap water and tank environment.
 
If you get that starter kit I linked to, its very easy and prescriptive. They send you the dosing bottles too, so you literally just spoon in the required teaspoons of salt from the provided bags, add some DI water, give it a shake, and you're literally done! It takes about 5 minutes. The bottles are dosing bottles too, so you only need to take the cap off, squeeze the bottle until the dosing section fills with the required dose volume, and pour it in the tank.
Thanks! I have seen the link but has been out of stock the last few times I checked. All in all does look very easy and so much cheaper!
Just an update on the tank. I added fish a few week ago and got carried away. I introduced them close to the planting of the Monte Carlo and hair grass and because of the fish and those new plants had not settled they kind of got pulled out haha so maybe another time.
I have finally increased the lighting to 7 hours but then CO2 was all over the place hence the black algae although my blue dwarf gouramis eat all the black algae when I make them fast for a day so maybe need to do that again to clear it all off the carpet on the right.
I also did trim the stems on the left and they haven’t really grown back fully yet but I had some other stems behind the red plant which are flourishing now which is nice.
Now on 3 squirts of Tropica SN and don’t see any more holes in leaves which is great or discolouration. Will definitely but the EI dosing though when it’s out.
 

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Hi again guys,

I am running out of my Tropica Specialised Nutrition so bought myself the EI dry dosing kit linked on the previous posts. I was just wondering as the dose of the EI method is always an excess of nutrients my current photoperiod is 7 hours so can I just increase it to 8 or 10 hours or should I do this week by week slowly by increasing by 30 mins or so in case something goes wrong?

Thanks!
 
Also, I calculated I need to add around 60ml of fert a day with the EI dosing method. As i'm using boiled tap water that turns out to be quite a bit of tap water that isn't dechlorinated. Can I add a dechlorinator like prime to the EI dosing bottles of macros and micro nutrients for storage? Or do I need to dechlorinate the whole tank after each EI dose?
 
I wonder if the Tropica bottle label is simply telling you how long the bottle will last if you pump 5 pumps a week rather than a dosing recommendation, because the recommendation on the Tropica website is different from the bottle?


Specialised Nutrition is added each week when the water is changed. The pump bottle dispenses 2 mL per push.
We recommend 6 mL (3 pumps) per 50 L water weekly.

And for those who actually measure such things, my tropica pump dispenses about 2.3ml per push if I push it fully down :p
 
I wonder if the Tropica bottle label is simply telling you how long the bottle will last if you pump 5 pumps a week rather than a dosing recommendation, because the recommendation on the Tropica website is different from the bottle?




And for those who actually measure such things, my tropica pump dispenses about 2.3ml per push if I push it fully down :p

Hi, to be honest that’s the reason why I’m switching the EI dosing because it’s so much cheaper than tropica SN in the long run.
 
Hi, to be honest that’s the reason why I’m switching the EI dosing because it’s so much cheaper than tropica SN in the long run.
For trace I recently switched over to this. For roughly similar trace contents dosing vs. Tropica I can literally make my own 300 ml bottles at 20 cents/bottle. (0.15 GBP). Of course, I am adding NPK, Ca/Mg separately (DIY and cheap as well).
 
As i'm using boiled tap water that turns out to be quite a bit of tap water that isn't dechlorinated.
Boiling will drive the chlorine out.
But not chloramine or heavy metals, so if your tapwater has other 'nasties' besides chlorine, especially anything that accumulates in the tank rather than dissipating, you might want to use a water conditioner, or use distilled or RO water.
But if chlorine is the only concern in your tapwater boiling it will be enough.
 
Boiling will drive the chlorine out.
But not chloramine or heavy metals, so if your tapwater has other 'nasties' besides chlorine, especially anything that accumulates in the tank rather than dissipating, you might want to use a water conditioner, or use distilled or RO water.
But if chlorine is the only concern in your tapwater boiling it will be enough.

Thanks! So I can just add the seachem prime straight into the fertiliser bottles that I make?
 
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