Search results

The advantage of the 'Original' stuff is that is doesn't contain loads of limestone which can greatly increase your pH and KH. I'm not sure what it does actually have mixed in, but all the other soils I've used have have pretty major impacts on water hardness, even the aquatic/pond soils. For...

'Original Aqua Soil' sold in blue bags at your local garden centre will cost you about a tenner, grows plants like crazy and won't mess with your water parameters too much. On the downside, it'll need a sand cap, is very messy if disturbed and will leach ammonia for a few weeks unless you...

It can be a bit of a fiddle - a good pair of planting tweezers makes a world of difference so definitely invest in a pair if you don't have any already. Wetting the soil will also help a bit. Then just patience!

Funny isn't it - I've always lived in really soft water areas and hard water tastes foul to me. The word 'aquifer' always sounds really thirst-quenching though.

Darrel thanks for that reply, I wanted to say similar but was in a rush at the time. Sent from my LT30p using Tapatalk

My memory is somewhat fuzzy, but iirc with my otherwise soft water I found that JI3 raised my pH by about 0.5-1 and TDS by about 100-150. However, that was in a shallow tank (relatively large ratio of soil:water) with somewhat infrequent water changes. It was definitely still raising pH and TDS...

Have you got a local aggregate company you can go and have a look around? I bought five different 20kg bags of sand from mine and mixed them to suit. Cost me about 12 quid for 100kg! Was a bit of an eye opener. Sent from my LT30p using Tapatalk

If you've got plecs I would fear clouding issues with Amazonian - it does crumble a little over time and mine has always released clouds of particles if disturbed. I'd go with sand, perhaps with plain old pond soil underneath if you're confident the bristle nose won't dig too much. If you...

Very few. I never had much luck with H. pinattifada in my harder water tank compared to the soft water ones but it could easily have been another factor at play. Can't think of any others from personal experience. Sent from my LT30p using Tapatalk

Yeah it was a pretty comparable to JI3. Bit less maybe, unfortunately I didn't record exact values. This was with relatively soft Edinburgh water. Sent from my LT30p using Tapatalk

Hmm. It gave me pH7.6-7.8 and increased conductivity by nearly 200 microS. Sent from my LT30p using Tapatalk

Sounds fine then. Just stick it in and give it a decent sand cap. I know Westland claim that the soil has already been through it's ammonia leaching phase, but I'd still err on the side of caution and hold off stocking for a couple of weeks until your plants are established and you can see lots...

Yup, it'll grow plants very well. Just be aware that added limestone will also push up your pH and hardness to some degree, which may be an issue if you were planning on keeping/breeding obligate freshwater fish in said tank.

I just went to a local aggregate company and bought several different sands to mix myself - bought 100kg for under 12 quid. Good old play sand from any garden centre, home base or Argos is usually cheap and fine if a little uninteresting.

I got loads of bubbles from my soil, never stopped although it does slow start a few months. It was pretty odourless so probably co2 building up. I wouldn't worry about it unless it's giving off a strong sulphurous smell.

I would definitely go with that over any of the John Innes mixes if you're keeping discus. Most of the JI and other commercial mixes will push your pH and hardness up considerably. http://www.gardeningdata.co.uk/soil/john_innes/john_innes.php

I don't have any info on what they add to that particular compost but the vast majority of commercial mixes seem to contain lime or ground limestone, so do a test to determine the effect it has on your water stats before using.

I made precisely the same mistake when setting up my tnak intially. Was planning on stocking paros, didn't realise what was in the JI3 and ended up with 400ppm and a pH of 7.8. See if anywhere near you has plain old topsoil. Or you could make your own with sand, grit, loam and leaf litter...

JI2 would be just fine for growing plants. Is this for your Paro tank? If so it really sin't suitable as it contains a lot of lime which will really push the pH and KH up. John Innes Composts explained

Personally I've never had issues with fairly deep sand and never stir it. Can't imagine the corys have any idea how much sand is underneath them either! Otherwise I'm sure someone will have an ingenious idea or two.

Sorry if I'm missing something but why not just have the sand 5cm deep?

I don't test GH or KH but have fairly soft water and found that Aquasoil significantly reduced the pH in my nano tanks compared to an inert substrate. However, after a period of time (6 months or so, I can't remember exactly) the effect wore off and now it has relatively little effect.

You can go uncapped if you have no or very low flow, no bottom dwellers and never intend to move anything around, but generally it's best to cap.

Erm, I have used play sand in the past and it was fine (and cheap!). I've got various black sands and micro gravels now which are a bit more expensive. Pool filter sand I've never used (never found a stockist locally) but it gets recommended a lot, I think the grain sizes tend to be larger than...

Personally I use sand to cap soil, purely for aesthetic reasons - cat litter always looks like cat litter to me! The soil itself has a pretty good CEC so an inert cap is fine. I dose almost nothing in my soil tanks, unless the floating/emergent plants are looking a bit sad, which is rare.

We talked about this a little bit towards the end of this thread - Starting up on the fresher side of fishkeeping. | Page 2 | UK Aquatic Plant Society To be honest, I'm not convinced about the whole fear of water changes in low tech. If you've got reasonable surface movement it shouldn't be an...

There's no need to use grit or a sand cap with Amazonia if you don't want to. It's nice hard balls of stuff, not really soil at all. Just checking you knew that - if you want to cap it for aesthetic reasons then obviously fire away! If you don't have livestock in the tank immediately then I...

That's the stuff.

Have used the Unipac black sand and also Dennerle black quartz 'gravel' (grain size is 1-2mm, so a bit larger but still visually quite sandy) with shrimp without issues.

I only did a test run of a day or two, no idea how long it'll take to deplete. JI3 will put pH around 7.5 in my experience, and add an extra 100-200 TDS to whatever is already in your water. Obviously will vary depending on how much you use. If you're after something that won't effect your water...

Yup. pH was 6.something and tds went through the roof.

Not much more to it really Pete. Have always capped mine with sand, I'm assuming that cat litter will hold it down OK, no experience with it though. You might find that there are bits of bark and wood in the compost which will try and float, but you can just scoop these out once the tank is...

Yeah I trialled this as well. You end up quite odd parameters where you have an acidic pH but very high TDS from the ferts. So still not good for soft water fish but you might find some use for it.

OK great, patience is very much a virtue with soil based tanks. Cheers. Just what me and Alastair figured out between us really.

Hi Pete, Pretty much all composts will grow plants well. You need to be a little bit aware of how they'll effect your water chemistry though, in order to pick the right sort for your livestock. Most commercial mixes like John Innes (John Innes Composts explained) contain limestone and a lot...

Yup I'll have a trim over the weekend and see how much I end up with, should be able to find a decent amount for you. Don't really see any need for adding JI3 to the aquatic compost, although I guess it can't hurt other than probably increasing the period of ammonia leaching a bit. And I agree...

Oops sorry, just the bowers soil I haven't used. Westlands should be fine.

Sounds like a plan. In my experience the water end pH is never anywhere near the soil pH stated on the packet. Expect it to rise, although I've not used those two you mention so it'll depend on what's in them. Haven't used fluorite myself but do add gravel/grit to reduce compaction. Each...

Hah, I don't know about that. Just passing on what meagre knowledge Alastair and I have acquired with a bit of trial and error over the last couple of years.

I've just checked the SeriouslyFish profile for M. boesemanii and they seem to like pH 8 and hard, so ignore what I was saying about RO etc. Buy either Westland's or some other aquatic compost, or a JI 1-3 mix and you should be good to go.

Doesn't seem to be much point using cat litter with soil to me... almost all soils should have a decent CEC on their own. If you're not in a rush then I'd try a few different soils out and see which give you the water params you want. If you're less patient then I'd go with Westland's Aquatic...

Cation exchange capacity. Essentially a measure of how well a soil holds on to nutrients. I'm not Troi, but I can give an answer to this. The answer depends on whether you want hard or soft water. The vast majority of commercial soil mixes contain a lot of limestone and fertilisers which will...

There's a breakdown of whats in all the JI mixes here - John Innes Composts explained

JI3 is 25% peat anyway, FYI.

Clive has inevitably provided a brilliant and in depth reply... from my simplistic point of view, the only immediate and obvious advantage to mineralising your soil before using it is to reduce the (potentially considerable) ammonia leaching that can occur in the first weeks of a soil tank...

Rinse it well to remove dust, as this can sometimes be tricky to filter out afterwards. Then just chuck it in.

Pond soil of some sort if I remember correctly. Can leach tannins for a long time, but purigen/carbon in the filter should sort that out. How much gravel cap do you have? Increasing the depth of cap or switching it for sand should stop the Amanos being able to get through it.

Heh no worries, I only found it because I remembered the thread... searched for 'blender ' :p

Funnily enough.... http://ukaps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f= ... it=blender

You could always try making your own compost... roughly equal quantities of peat, lime-free grit/sand and loam would do the trick. Tricky bit is finding loam without any added fertilisers - but you could always just dig some up if you've got some clean woods nearby.

I've not been able to find a breakdown of the components for this mix, but I strongly suspect it'll just be a standard compost mix with added grit. As such, it probably contain a hefty amount of limestone, phosphates and sulphates. Whilst this will do a great job of growing plants it will also...

Should be fine, just be aware that nearly all commercial soil mixes will raise the pH and hardness of your water quite considerably. This is obviously only a problem if you intend on keeping the more delicate soft-water fish, but worth mentioning. Alastair and I have tried a few different soils...

Hi Eric. You can use soil on it's own without a cap, but you will kick up a lot of mess if you ever try and rearrange any plants or hardscape, or are a bit gung-ho with water top offs. Similarly, bottom dwellers such as loaches and corydoras would probably be a bad idea. Also, be aware that...

JI number 3 (and most of the other JI mixes) contains lime or chalk, which will raise your water pH and hardness considerably. Unless you're planning on keeping hardwater fish, I would go with JI cutting compost, which is supposedly free of lime and added fertlisers -...

Yup, although you have to be a bit picky and avoid those with added manure, lime or large amounts of wood chipping. Pond or cutting composts are often a good bet.

Soil and a sand/gravel cap will actually do everything you need a planted substrate to do, and cost almost nothing. That's pretty good value if you ask me.

Oops, my bad. Saw the non-Euro currency and assumed it was outside the EU. Sorry!

Don't forget about import duty guys, might make things seem a less good value.

Good info. Any chance of some close up shots of this?

As coincidence would have it I not 10 minutes ago flooded a tank containing the new amazonia. Was going to post here in agreement about the clarity of the water but then unwittingly switched on the filter with the intake stuck in the soil... cue brown cloud :lol:

Its the 'bucket of mud ' journal thread Troi.

I'm a big fan of soil substrates, my big low tech soil-based tank has now been running a year with nice steady growth and not a hint of lagae. Great from an economy point of view as well, although I must admit to using ADA Aquasoil in my nanos as it's just a bit easier to work with and doesn't...

Yeah, living in Scotland has made me tight :lol:

for a 2" layer you're going to want about 14-15 litres, by my calculations, so 2 bags should do it.