EI DOSING USING DRY SALTS

[ian_m]

There is always Ebay. But heed the warnings on ferts section about buying from Ebay. Numerous people have received white salts from scrupulous cheap sellers that are certainly not what is advertised and will more than likely be fatal to your livestock, but may make your plants grow.

Just pay the £10 and at least you know exactly what you are getting.

 

[Edvet]

Don't know where you are, but this is from the Netherlands:http://www.aquariumbemesting.nl/nl/home

 

[Manu]

Thanks guys ☺
I order everything from aquariumplant food.co.uk. I spent over £60 to get the free delivery and from my calculations I should have enough for 2.7 years
That's about 42 pence a week, not bad!
Cheers,
Manu

 

[snobi]

hi creg hi tom, I started planted tank while reading all your thread/post thank you so much. started from fishless cycling and so on.

I have a question regarding of this product it keeps me confuse on how to how that to mix this. its a powder form of 250g per pack. the name of product was SIAM Fertilizer "FLOWER BLOOM"

NPK - 10-15-35 i was wonder if this 10% or 1% ...
and this is the other element with percentage the mixture said in the packaging was 2 TBSP per 4Gallon.
Mg 0.120%
S 0.000%
B 0.015%
Cu 0.007%
Fe 0.040%
Mn 0.020%
Mo 0.002%
Zn 0.005%
i was wondering how can i achieve the mixture of TPN+ from here. i don't have the individual chemical even though i want to dose dry salts, its really hard real hard to find chemical for planting here in Philippines even its a tropical and a lot of farm. many chemicals here is you need a license specially KNO3 (this is the very hard to find). other is by luck. Could you please help me to calculate this? please.

my first mix is 1tsp in 2Liter and i dont know whats next, the reason i ask is that my plant is melting from the bottom. I read that it needs a proper circulation and good co2 level. my light is somewhat very low its a led strip. my co2 is 1-2bps, my filter is diy cannister 350GPH. please enlighten mmy on this. I'll be living the country so i want to know what is the right or accurate enough to mix and target the TPN+ my wife will handle from this so i want to teach him everything i know.

 

[ian_m]

Be careful as general fertilisers usually contain ammonia compounds, as it is one for the cheapest ways of giving nitrogen to plants. If a commercial fertiliser may be ammonium nitrate, but for domestic generally use a variation of ammonium citrate type compound. Both toxic to fish.

 

[snobi]

Be careful as general fertilisers usually contain ammonia compounds, as it is one for the cheapest ways of giving nitrogen to plants. If a commercial fertiliser may be ammonium nitrate, but for domestic generally use a variation of ammonium citrate type compound. Both toxic to fish.

probably this is by ammonium nitrate but the trace is all chelated, In my current state as of now i do not encounter any algae or death from my fauna. as of now in my 50 gallon i have small community really small because its for test. may i know what is the proper computation of mixing this to liquid or at least make it TPN+, please? i was really confuse with this. because i do not have the individual element needed to dose dry salts.

almost every important element for plant fertilizer here in the philippines is prohibited.

 

[Jayefc1]

Wow can't say anything else just an amazing read by far the best explanation I've read thanks for ur time and effort

 

[Something Fishy]

Awesome article very informative. How does the light wattage relate to the duration? You mention ideal params and 20/40 watt lights but doubling lights on time would have the same effect right? Thanks!

 

[ceg4048]

Awesome article very informative. How does the light wattage relate to the duration? You mention ideal params and 20/40 watt lights but doubling lights on time would have the same effect right? Thanks!

Hi,
Glad you find the information useful.
To answer your question it's necessary to understand the way light works. Imagine driving your car on the Motorway. You can drive in the slow lane or in the passing lane. In this analogy the light acts as the accelerator pedal. The farther you depress the pedal the faster the car goes and the greater the rate of petrol consumption.
In the analogy, the nutrients and CO2 are the petrol and the plants growth rate is analogous to the car's velocity.
So adding more light intensity is the same as depressing the pedal and the effect is that the plants grow faster. If there is not enough petrol in the tank however, the car soon stalls and you are stranded on the side of road.

So there is very little relationship between the amount of light intensity and it's duration. Too much light without enough nutrition consumes the available resources more quickly and empties the tank more quickly. Leaving the pedal depressed for longer does nothing to help the plant.

In any case, plants only use the light for about 6-8 hours and then they typically shut down, so again, duration is a diurnal issue and is not directly coupled to intensity.

Hope this clarifies.

Cheers,

 

[Deanne]

Your article is very helpful, thank you. Still panic about my nitrates being high on water change day. Been dosing EI for about a three week, plants look much better, less algae, more green.

 

[ceg4048]

...Been dosing EI for about a three week, plants look much better, less algae, more green.

Another satisfied customer.
Another mind freed from the tyranny of The Matrix.

Cheers,

 

[Something Fishy]

Hi,
Glad you find the information useful.
To answer your question it's necessary to understand the way light works. Imagine driving your car on the Motorway. You can drive in the slow lane or in the passing lane. In this analogy the light acts as the accelerator pedal. The farther you depress the pedal the faster the car goes and the greater the rate of petrol consumption.
In the analogy, the nutrients and CO2 are the petrol and the plants growth rate is analogous to the car's velocity.
So adding more light intensity is the same as depressing the pedal and the effect is that the plants grow faster. If there is not enough petrol in the tank however, the car soon stalls and you are stranded on the side of road.

So there is very little relationship between the amount of light intensity and it's duration. Too much light without enough nutrition consumes the available resources more quickly and empties the tank more quickly. Leaving the pedal depressed for longer does nothing to help the plant.

In any case, plants only use the light for about 6-8 hours and then they typically shut down, so again, duration is a diurnal issue and is not directly coupled to intensity.

Hope this clarifies.

Cheers,

Thanks for that it does make a lot of sense yeah. 6-8 hours I guess is what I needed too, as I currently run 4 on my nano to reduce algae but notice diatoms increase with less light and I lost most of my Cuba carpet doing this. I am currently looking at running co2 in a sump with a Dennerle coil diffuser and I have Amazonia so been slack on ferts but want to look into EI for this tank and my new one.

I will do some calculations and see what I can come up with for the setups. But in general you don’t cater durations for EI calcs, but they could affect the consumption of the nutrients from the plants right, as more exposure time to the same wattage?

Thanks

 

[ceg4048]

Hi,
Well it really would be very difficult to cater to light duration because the plants uptake nutrients all day, regardless of whether the light is on or not. A lot of things happen in the dark. The nutrient uptake is higher in the light, of course. In any case this avenue of thinking is not really the right path. The reason for limiting the light duration is that algae appreciate light much more than the higher plants do.

As a result, your observation of the diatom behavior, unfortunately, is in error. Too much light, in conjunction with the chemical instability of the tank triggers diatom blooms. Diatomic blooms can occur when the tank is first setup, but after a few weeks, if the light intensity is not over the top, the blooms subside and usually we don't see this type of algae again. Your Cuba was lost due to poor CO2, not due to poor light. Hobbyists often fall victim to observations of things in the tank that are circumstantial evidence. The fact that many people fall victim to this illusion and report their conclusions leads others down the same path, so the new victims increase their lighting and do not pay enough attention to CO2/flow/distribution implementation.

Do not overthink nutrition. The EI dosing scheme is made to simplify this aspect of plant husbandry. Margins of error are already built in, whether the intensity and/or duration are varied. There is a wide range of nutrient values that plants can use to be healthy.

Too many people look for a way out or extra methods of adjusting the dosing. I suspect that this is due to a subconscious fear of nutrients.
EI requires neither adjustments due to duration, nor testing of parameters. Simply dose the standard values and carry on.
CO2/flow/distribution as well as cleanliness are where the complexity and difficulty hide. Study and implement these other factors and I guarantee you will see improvements in your tanks.

Cheers,

 

[Something Fishy]

Thanks man, again, great reply! Oddly diatoms were no issue when first setup and HC went mad. Even with 4 hour lights, the algae went and plants grew! I have been very sketchy on and off with a solid co2 supply as I’ve often not planned for a run out or such and constant absorption was a problem, or too much gas loss with an inaccurate drop checker (and why I wanted to try an in sump dissolving solution to use less gas.) This combined with disturbed Amazonia saw diatoms start to appear. I think what you’ve said about co2 makes great sense and I’m armed now to try some new things! Flow is heavy as I always over filter for tank size and use big pumps for that reason so I hope that’s covered!

Once I’ve built my sumps and got things a little more under control I’ll start sharing my progress on here in some journals I think to help others and build on my learning and mistakes.

You’re right though about forums and info, Chinese whispers is certainly a problem and easy to copy others a lot when you don’t fully understand even if wrong.

Last query on the topic - Amazonia I know friends use doseless and get great growth for years. Realistically, would you still need to dose with it and how long should it stay nutrient rich for? I read dosing K would be of help for other nutrient uptake regardless but with soils like that being so rich I wondered if EI would just be overkill within say first couple of years?

Cheers

 

[ceg4048]

Hi,
Yes, the ADA Amazonia scheme is also very successful because the clay pellets are soaked in a nutrient rich solution and are baked onto the clay. When flooded the high concentration of nutrients dissolve and leech into the water column. Aquatic plants feed equally as well from the substrate through the roots as they do from the water column through the leaves. What's also nice about the substrate feeding is that you do not have to worry too much about dosing intervls. At some point however the sediment becomes depleted. How long this takes depends on the plant mass as well as the levels of CO2 and light intensity and so forth. This may occur within a few months to a year. Evens so, since plants will accept nutrition form either location, it is a good idea to dose the water column in combination with the nutrient rich sediment. This helps not only the plants with roots, but is also even more important for plants that do not have roots such as mosses, epiphytes and rhizome type plants.

Cheers,

 

[mooncake]

Thank you for this. I’m going to have a read through tonight as I was initially put off by the thought of EI ferts, but having read a little about it elsewhere it doesn’t actually seem too complicated.

 

[Grant Binnie]

Very helpful thread. Going to be using EI Dosing for a 200L tank with Tropica Soil so this has given me some confidence in trying out EI ferts.

 

[SaCanada]

Best Article ever! thanks a lot!
Going EI mode - NOW!
One thing which I may have missed or misunderstood is that with the powder in hand I can either go pouring directly into the tank following a routine for that or I can also create a solution and dose accordingly. Correct?

 

[Zeus.]

Best Article ever! thanks a lot!
Going EI mode - NOW!
One thing which I may have missed or misunderstood is that with the powder in hand I can either go pouring directly into the tank following a routine for that or I can also create a solution and dose accordingly. Correct?

yes either method is good, making a solution just makes it easier if you have an auto dosser which can put a certain volume in of either solution on different days which means it can be done automatically - great for hols, but the salts need to be added manually on dosing days

 

[Neocaridina]

@ceg4048, I don’t think I can find KNO3. Can I substitute KCl or K2SO4 at the same teaspoon dose?