Amazon sword help

[John q]

So should I continue to use the same GLA Micro Mix as I was using before?

You'll probably find you get different answers to this question. For, me the product is fine, do I think you need 0.37ppm Fe weekly in this tank? It's unlikely. With that in mind, especially if you go down down the leaner Macro/lower kh route outlined above then you can probably get away with adding less, how much less is the unknown by me or anybody else.

If you go front loading Macro's (which is what I do btw) then I'd try using the same Micro mix but add 5ml 3x a week. Add the first dose the day after you do the wc, eg Saturday water change, Sunday add 5ml Micro, Tuesday add 5ml of Micro and Thursday add 5ml Micro. This would add 0.158ppm Fe.
Try this for a few weeks and see how the plants respond. If the plants look healthy and you decide you want to go even lower with the iron levels then reduce a bit more (say 4ml x3 doses).

Ultimately your plants will tell you what is or isn't enough, we are ultimately guessing based on our own experiences with our unique aquatic ecosystems.

 

[MichaelJ]

So should I continue to use the same GLA Micro Mix as I was using before?

Yes, that would be my recommendation. The GLA Micro Mix is esentially Plantex CSM+B - I've been using that for ages in one of my tanks. Works fine in soft, low alkalinity (KH), slightly acidic water. Only caveat with these dry mixes is that you have to make sure they are throughly mixed (I shake mine vigorously before I measure it up) before batching them up in a dosing bottle with distilled water and of course you have to make sure the batch is preserved (I personally use Ascorbic acid and a bit of Potassium Sorbate) - you can find plenty of info around UKAPS on this topic as well as info on alternative micro blends if you should go down that route.

Next question ... do you measure and add the individual salts to the RO water each week?

Yes, the salts I intent to add to my WC water I weigh out on a scale (I use a microgram scale), but since your dealing with a fairly large quantity of water a milligram scale will offer enough precision. Keep in mind you only have to worry about this once a week - or whatever frequency you do water changes down the road. I never felt compelled to pre-batch my NPK. Shouldn't take you more than a couple of minutes to weigh out the 5-6 compounds mentioned above.

Say, you multiply everything by 10, add that to a container, then add 1/10 of that to the RO water each week? Dumb question?

Not a dumb question at all... many around here actually pre-batch it that way and dose in that manner, so yes you can do that with the minerals and NPKs above except for CaSO4 and CaCO3 as they wont dissolve in a small bottle... If you should decide to pre-batch Calcium you will have to use CaCl2 instead of CaSO4 / CaCO3 or just dose them separately in dry form due to their very low solubility.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[jellybean]

If you go front loading Macro's (which is what I do btw) then I'd try using the same Micro mix but add 5ml 3x a week. Add the first dose the day after you do the wc, eg Saturday water change, Sunday add 5ml Micro, Tuesday add 5ml of Micro and Thursday add 5ml Micro. This would add 0.158ppm Fe.
Try this for a few weeks and see how the plants respond. If the plants look healthy and you decide you want to go even lower with the iron levels then reduce a bit more (say 4ml x3 doses).

Got it. That will be the plan.

Yes, the salts I intent to add to my WC water I weigh out on a scale (I use a microgram scale), but since your dealing with a fairly large quantity of water a milligram scale will offer enough precision. Keep in mind you only have to worry about this once a week - or whatever frequency you do water changes down the road. I never felt compelled to pre-batch my NPK. Shouldn't take you more than a couple of minutes to weigh out the 5-6 compounds mentioned above.

I have a scale so that's the way I will do it. But ... another question. I can do the remineralization by the recipe for the 29ish gallons of water in the reservoir. And that will get me to the target Kh and Gh. But if I use that water for multiple tanks (I have a few smaller ones) then do I need to dose the NPK individually to each tank? And not add that to the reservoir?

Sorry for all the questions. Just trying to wrap my head around all of this.

 

[MichaelJ]

But if I use that water for multiple tanks (I have a few smaller ones) then do I need to dose the NPK individually to each tank? And not add that to the reservoir?

Prepping the same water for multiple tanks makes things a bit more involved. If you target different NPK or different % WC but target the same dGH and dKH across all tank you can just remineralize the container (reservoir) and use the same water across the tanks but dose the varying weekly amounts of NPK individually. The NPK calculations in post #15 are targeting your 100 US Gallon tank based on a 25 US Gallon weekly water change or 25%. So if you have a smaller tank and change exactly the same 25% (say a 10 gallon tank and change 2.5 gallon) using that reservoir water you will get the same amount of NPK ppm's as you would get in the 100 Gallon tank.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[jellybean]

Prepping the same water for multiple tanks makes things a bit more involved. If you target different NPK or different % WC but target the same dGH and dKH across all tank you can just remineralize the container (reservoir) and use the same water across the tanks but dose the varying weekly amounts of NPK individually.

Ok, this is the way I will need to do it. The amount of water I change in each tank varies.

Can you explain the best way to do that? Make a solution and use a certain dose for each tank?

 

[MichaelJ]

Ok, this is the way I will need to do it. The amount of water I change in each tank varies.

If the percentage is different for each tank you will not get the amounts of NPK specified above. However, if your main tank is 25% weekly and the others perhaps a little more or less (say 20-30%) weekly I wouldn't worry too much about it and use the same WC water, but if it's a much smaller (or larger) amount and say more or less frequently you will have to calculate and do the NPK dosing individually.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[jellybean]

but if it's a much smaller (or larger) amount and say more or less frequently you will have to calculate and do the NPK dosing individually.

Ok, this is what I’ll do. Thanks again for your help.

 

[jellybean]

Ok, I would appreciate it if someone would check my understanding of making a solution and my math. I've read multiple threads here and the 2HR Aquarist instructions for making a custom solution. And I've run some numbers through the Rotala Butterfly calculator. Here's what I came up with for front loading the macros for 20 gallons of water using @MichaelJ targets from above. Keep in mind I am not a scientist, am terrible at math, and am in way over my head.

Container Volume: 500 ml

Dose size: 10ml

MgNO3 for a target of 1.5 ppm of N ... add 11.74 grams
KH2PO4 for a target of 0.25 ppm P ... add 1.36 grams
K2SO4 for a target of 1 ppm K ... add 12.65 grams

Is that right? Close? Nowhere near? I used K2SO4 instead of KHCO3 because I have more of it and because I couldn't figure out how to make it calculate for K using the KHCO3. It wanted to calculate for dKH.

If it is right, then if I change 20 gallons of water in the 100 gallon tank, I would add 10ml of this solution to the tank after the WC and that would front load it for macros for a week. If I change 10 gallons of water in another tank, I would add 5ml. And so on.

Am I getting there???

 

[MichaelJ]

Keep in mind I am not a scientist, am terrible at math, and am in way over my head.

No worries - we get a ton of questions about this! its not a prerequisite that your a scientist to mix your own fertilizers. You just have to keep things simple and build an intuition for the topic by asking yourself the right questions:

The tank you ask about is 20 US gallon or 76 Liters.

If you want to dose 10 ml per week to add 1.5 ppm N from MgNO3. How many ppm would that 10 ml have to be in order to provide 1.5 ppm in 76 liter? So 1 liter is 1000 ml... your tank is 76000 ml. So the ppm's you need in 10 ml to provide 1.5 in 76000 ml is 1.5 / (10 / 76000) or 1.5 * (76000 / 10) = 11400 ppm N.

Your dosing bottle is 500 ml. 1 gram of MgNO3 in 1 liter gives you 110 ppm of N. So you will need 11400 / 110 = 103 grams if it would be a 1 liter bottle, but since you're dosing from a 500 ml bottle it would be 103 / 2 = 51.5 grams.

You can check this with rotalabutterfly. Punch in 0.5 liter DYI dosing and select 51 grams of MgNO3 and select the "result of my dose" you should get somewhere around 11400 ppm. of N.

So if you dose 10 ml of 11400 ppm of N into 76 liter you get 10/76000 x 11400 = 1.5 ppm.

Use the same approach for the other compounds you're planning to add. One thing you have to be careful about is solubility - the ability to dissolve the compound in the dosing bottle. The solubility of MgNO3 is 42 grams / 100 ml so that will be just fine.

And of course, for your 100 Gallon tank (which is 5 times larger than your 20 gallon tank) you just dose 5 times 10 ml to obtain the same concentration (1.5 ppm) of N.

I hope this helps!

Cheers,
Michael

 

[jellybean]

While I try to wrap my brain around this … can you clarify something for me? With front loading, am I targeting the whole tank or just the water change volume?

 

[MichaelJ]

While I try to wrap my brain around this … can you clarify something for me? With front loading, am I targeting the whole tank or just the water change volume?

The prescribed 1.5 N from MgNO3 and dosing mentioned above is based on the whole tank, if you would only be targeting the WC water amount with 1.5 N and you replace 25% you would only be adding 1.5 * (25%/100) ppm = 0.375 ppm of N per week to the whole tank.

Cheers,
Michael

 

[jellybean]

Got it! Thank you!

 

[jellybean]

If you go front loading Macro's (which is what I do btw) then I'd try using the same Micro mix but add 5ml 3x a week. Add the first dose the day after you do the wc, eg Saturday water change, Sunday add 5ml Micro, Tuesday add 5ml of Micro and Thursday add 5ml Micro. This would add 0.158ppm Fe.
Try this for a few weeks and see how the plants respond. If the plants look healthy and you decide you want to go even lower with the iron levels then reduce a bit more (say 4ml x3 doses).

Thanks @John q I started dosing this way after Monday’s WC. Will see how it goes. I appreciate your help.