A
Antipofish
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Re: ADA 60-P planted tank 'Prairie' (week 8) video
Great new video. A hive of activity 🙂
Great new video. A hive of activity 🙂
Ady34 said:not a bad place for the cardinals to end up!, good luck catching them again if your mate wants them back
They seem to have encouraged your widows out too
Id have thought with your plant mass there will be no issue with the new stock overloading the filter, your tank is a giant one!
Cheerio,
Ady.
pariahrob said:Ady, that is very nearly word for word what I was told the other day, down to the marine analogy too.
I must search for this aquascaping bible you guys must have hidden away.
It's a conspiracy against newbies, I'm sure of it!
Like i said.... ready to be shot down in flames!.... but it was just an analogy about the filtering effects of in tank medias.... we also tend not to run our high tech planted tanks without filters, so the point was that its about the extra level of filtration that the plants and substrate provide thus aiding our filters, not replacing them.Antipofish said:Did the marine analogy also include mention of protein skimmers as a requirement, especially when using just live rock as filtration ? I remember when I ran a marine tank I had to use a skimmer (ok ok I used a Deltec AP 850, which was a MONSTER of a skimmer for my 4ft tank, LOL, in fact it looked SO SEXY that I had it positioned outside the cabinet to show it off 😳 😳 ), and the skimmer was responsible for removing a large amount of the waste before it got to live rock filtration stage. So I am wondering how that part of the marine theory applies in freshwater.
In addition to the above, and in reference to the plants being overloaded with the ferts we provide, this is true to an extent, but as i understand it plants prefer the uptake of nitrogen in the form of ammonia, which is in our case 'fish wastes'. When we add more fish to a thriving, established heavily planted tank the ammonia is preferred by the plants to our fertiliser nitrogen sources so they use it up, thus filtering the water of the ammonia without the need for filter bacteria to grow in numbers to cope. Obviously theres no harm in doing extra water changes etc, but planted tanks are better than fish only tanks at coping with extra fish stock. The only reason i know anything about it is because of the tobi's special n fertilizer thread, and its use of urea as a nitrogen source. Some leave out the urea and replace it with other less risky nitrogen fertilisers, but seemingly the plants prefer it direct from the fish...still warmAntipofish said:Hi Ady,
this is interesting info.... are you saying that because of the large plant mass, this filters out such a large proportion of the fish waste ? I am very interested, especially if there is some kind of equation about this. I have heard that plants use fish waste, but need to get my head round that in terms of EI dosing... surely if we are already "overloading" the plants with ferts in terms if EI dosing then fish waste is also "over and above" what the plants require (or can utilise)? Or doesn't it work like that ?
(Sorry Rob, hope you don't mind me initiating a slight tangent on your thread... I know you like these mini discussions from a learning aspect though, and it looks like I am about to learn yet something new too )
As the others have said this is the right idea. If we just deal with nitrogen (N), you have 3 main sources.this is interesting info.... are you saying that because of the large plant mass, this filters out such a large proportion of the fish waste ? I am very interested, especially if there is some kind of equation about this. I have heard that plants use fish waste, but need to get my head round that in terms of EI dosing... surely if we are already "overloading" the plants with ferts in terms if EI dosing then fish waste is also "over and above" what the plants require (or can utilise)? Or doesn't it work like that ?