John q
Member
I'd love to do this but all the recipes I've seen seem rather complicated involving serial dilution and the likes. Anybody got a simple to follow recipe (even if it includes seriel dilution)? Obviously I have 0.01 scales at hand.
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Lean dosing pros and cons
- Thread starter Riverside Scaper
- Start date
hehe Fe being the only exception 🙂. All others can be non chelated. The amount of traces you are adding are so minute that you don't really need chelation and anyway plants prefer the raw staff! Micros are also being dosed normally daily (at least more often than macros if you frond load them) so no real need for chelated traces. Finally some chelates have some PH requirements and they are not the same for all traces. Read < here > onwards.
Well the IFC calculator (DIYTraceCalculator sheet) allows you to clone other commercial traces, so there isn't much thinking involved.
@John q For the serial dilution we made things in the calculator pretty simple. The calculator actually explains in plain words what steps you need to take to make a serial dilution. Serial dillution is usually only really needed for Cu, Mo, Ni and Co. I personally don't even add Co and I think pretty much no one does.
Edit: by "needed" I meant advisable/recommended. The majority of us common mortals don't have lab grade high precision analytical scales with a 0.001g accuracy hence why serial dilution is preferable to weighting minute amounts.
Edit: by "needed" I meant advisable/recommended. The majority of us common mortals don't have lab grade high precision analytical scales with a 0.001g accuracy hence why serial dilution is preferable to weighting minute amounts.
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John q
Member
That’s exactly the reason I don’t want them individually! 😂
Does anyone even know the ideal ratio of all the micros for aquatic plants?
KirstyF
Member
Whilst the serial dilution might seem a bit faffy at the outset, the joy of it is that once you’ve done them, they last a looooong time.
For example, this little bottle has been going for 14wks already so I reckon I’ll get close to a year out of it and making up the micro from the dilutions is easy peasy. I’ve diluted everything except FE just for convenience.
You don't need to know them, simply clone commercial traces 🙂
So which is the best commercial trace mix to clone? 😆
John q
Member
One advantage of lean dosing is that it makes the commercial all-in-one ferts last longer! 😎
I'm using a 500ml bottle of APT EI. According to instructions, I should be dosing 2.5ml a day but I'm only dosing 0.9ml which will last me 555 days. The cost to me is manageable.
I'm using a 500ml bottle of APT EI. According to instructions, I should be dosing 2.5ml a day but I'm only dosing 0.9ml which will last me 555 days. The cost to me is manageable.
The one you wish to clone. 😎. That one will be the best one.
@Wookii The one I used without the gluconate.
Would this apply equally to zero dKH, 1 dKH and 10 dKH water?"
@Wookii
you can pick up any of the Micro/Fe recipes that I have posted. many people use Edward's PPS system, this recipe should work with any system you like: PPS PRO based custom Micro Recipehere is the full complete clone version of Seachem Flourish Trace if you are interested: Seachem Flourish Trace Clone
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MichaelJ
Member
A middle of the road approach would be starting our with a good trace mix such as the Nilocg Plantex CMS-B (which is the one I am using). If I want add of something which is absent from this mix (such as Nickel, Na, Fe Gluconate), I just add that to the mix when I am making the 500 ml bottles for my two tanks. Currently a bottle last for 16 weeks. Of course, If you want that full control over the ingredients and ratios, as you would need to do a clone, there is no other way than buying and mixing everything yourself.
Cheers,
Michael
plantnoobdude
Member
I would recommending cloning tenso numbers. they work very well for me. from there you can work on it to make a good mix for your tank.
anywhere from 0.05~0.2ppm should work well weekly. with soft water (low gh/kh) you can choose a smaller dose. with higher gh (above 4-5) I would choose 0.1-0.2ppm weekly of Fe.
the numbers should be
0.1ppm Fe dtpa
0.067ppm Mn EDTA
0.014ppm Cu EDTA
0.014ppm Zn EDTA
0.014 B boric acid
0.003ppm Mo nh4mo
0.0001ppm Ni (optional)
what I am doing now, is raising Fe to 0.15ppm weekly. Cu is at half dose 0.007.
I am also using Urea, very low K (around 2ppm per week) and moderate P.
I prefer chelated metals to keep animals safe. if you have more gh then you can add more of the micros witohut risk to fish. but the exact dose will depend on other factors.
I observed positive results from just swapping micros and keeping at EI macros. less issues with macrandra, wallichii and cuphea. everything else stayed the same really. If the mix doesnt work for you, you can always clone something else similar to csm+b.
I am not sure If a tank can be maintained long term with tenso and EI macros long term, but I have a feeling it'd be worth a try.
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the major problem with CSM+B is below:
when you take a spoon or whatever gram and mix it in the water, you are not 100% sure if you are adding more or less of several nutrients, look at this picture for example: if you took a spoon of CSM+B from the upper part, you will be adding more Copper, if you take a spoon from the lower part, it might be lacking copper. considering some of the nutrients that are needed in low ppm, you might be either missing those or they might not be present in the ppm that you should be getting.
I use to modify csm+b with Mnso4 and Fe DTPA, people who still want to use CSM+B should benefit from this : Perpetual Preservation System - Nutrient imbalance TE
also do consider that some seller do add Boron separately to CSM, how accurately they add them and mix them would be another question.
