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New member.... various questions/help required!

KrisPol

New Member
Joined
14 May 2021
Messages
7
Location
Haverhill
Hi All,

Just wanter do introduce myself and at the same time ask some questions :)

1st- Thank you to both Gentlemen's at Aquarium Gardens yesterday for all your help and directions to this forum- much appreciated.

I have been in reef aquarium hobby for about 10 year and I did attempt tropical set up couple of years ago with rather unimpressive results...

Could somebody answer some more questions I have about this setup please. I have 160L (35 gallon) tank with light fitting that came in the box as standard 21W LED strips which gives pretty much even light across the tank. Not sure if this is adequate etc.?

I run 1 Oase 250 Canister filter with built in heater- again not sure if this is enough? I have adjusted temperature from 27 degrees to 23.5 after yesterday's visit to the store. What would be recommended water changes frequency and what percentage?

Fish- about 20 Neons and 2 Siamese Algae Eater only. Considering adding shrimp once it's all established as I absolutely loved them yesterday.

CO2 runs in line with lighting times but this will be changed to come on about 3h before lights come on once I get additional timer.

Water itself- possibly main reason I did fail previously and was no wiser until yesterday- I was using softened water from the nearest tap... now all replaced with super hard tap water we get in this area.

I use TNC complete fertiliser once per week- 15ml in line with label instructions. Added Neo Plants Tab's yesterday as instructed.

I would be grateful for any feedback and recommendations- I don't want to fail at this ever again.

P.S. Would UV in line steriliser be required at some point?

Attached photos of what it looked like yesterday vs today.

 

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Hi all,
I would be grateful for any feedback and recommendations- I don't want to fail at this ever again.
I'd just have a good read around the threads on the forum. I work on the theory that some-one will have asked any, and every, question at some time in the past.

We actually have quite a few members from East Anglia, who will have similar tap water to you, so I'll cc. in @castle , @MirandaB and @Geoffrey Rea as well as @Karmicnull etc.

Personally I'd keep an eye out for <"iron (Fe) deficiency">, it is about the only deficiency symptom that is easy to diagnose and much more likely <"in hard water">, it may require you to use a <"different chelator"> for iron.

cheers Darrel
 
Welcome! I'm also in East Anglia and I use water straight from the tap, with some Tetra AquaSafe conditioner added with no obvious problems. For fertiliser I use dry salts with slightly modifed (Estimative index | Fireplace aquarium) 'Estimative Index' (EI) dosing with materials sourced from APFUK, again without any obvious problems.
 
I’m not sure about the power of the filter, I know oase make excellent filters but I’m not sure about the flow rate, and have enough circulation. See how it goes, it may be fine. It can be easily fixed with a circulation pump. I work on the common rule that the filter should turn over 10 x the volume, so 1600ltr/hr. All Oase’s filters seem underpowered in the technical data for the maximum tank sizes, but they do work. Have a chat with guys at aquarium gardens. Look for dead spots in the tank, surface movement and any where detritus collects. I use an oase filtosmart 100 on my 37 litre, It seems to work okay, I am upgrading to a 70ltr tank and I’m not convinced it will be powerful enough, but will try it. You can also boost it with a second filter but that really shouldn’t be necessary on 160ltr tank.
I use an oase UV steriliser on my 200ltr, I was having a lot of issues with a persistent disease that affected fish and nothing I did seemed to solve the problem, since installing it I have had no problems, and it will kill all pathogens and algae cells in the water column. The only negative is it will reduce your flow rate a bit. A lot scapers don’t use them, but compared to all the other equipment and the cost they are not very expensive and solve a lot of issues.
I’ve never used TNC, but with all fertilisers the dosage guidelines are incorrect, I dose every day and have great results, I also use root tabs. All this said, check out George Farmers tips for start ups, he will tell you all you know, graduated lighting and water changes. The most important thing to remember is maintenance, 50% water changes 1/week, remove dead leaves, clean glass and any algae from surfaces and so on. Good luck
 
As Darrel says, WRT East Anglia water and Ferts, there are two things to be mindful of due to the water hardness and consequent pH / Calcium Ions:

Biggest issue: if you buy an off-the-shelf micro mix it's likely to use the wrong Iron Chelate (EDTA) which is only good up to pH 6.0. You'll mabybe want to supplement with DPTA (good up to pH 7.0) or EDDHA (good beyond pH 9.0) I use EDDHA and it's made an observable difference. Some people don't like it as it can tint the water pink. I'm low tech and only dosing 30% EI, so it's not a problem for me. I got my EDDHA iron from Solufeed.
Chelated Iron_IMGP6687.jpg


Secondly the high calcium content can interfere with the uptake of magnesium (see <this post> from Darrel), so some people boost their MGSO4 slightly to compensate. But like all these things it depends on your setup and what your plants are telling you.

Can't comment on CO2 Injection etc. I'll leave that to others :D.

Cheers,
Simon
 
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