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Root Ferts for Swords

jameson_uk

Member
Joined
10 Jun 2016
Messages
879
Location
Birmingham
My tank is in theory low tech (but has pretty high lighting). Since i have covered about 50% of the surface in floaters the plants seem to be doing better and I am not adding ferts.

I replaced my dwarf swords and a fair bit of my rotala with Limnophila sessiliflora which seems to do well and under the high light it grows like a monster.

I have a large crypt and a couple of swords. I have always stuck a Tropica root tab underneath every couple of months and they have done OK. Ran out of root tabs and LFS doesn't seem to stock them any more, a lot of online retailers are also listing them as no longer available or out of stock.

I went for the Tropica tabs as they contained NPK and macros but most of root tabs don't have any N or P.

I think the swords need ferts as the new growth looks very washed out and is not growing very well at all.

I came across JBL The 7 Balls which are clay balls which are certainly no N or P and state "Storage capacity for nutrients. No deficiency symptoms: important trace elements such as iron, minerals" and more interesting say they only need replacing once a year.

Tank is reasonably well stocked and fed daily so I guess N and P are probably fine in the water column but I believe swords and crypts take much less from the water than they will from the roots?

So after the rambling do they need N and P from the roots and if so, are they any other root tabs out there which contain them? (I don't have time to mess around rolling my own at the minute as having a new born means I have very little time or energy....)
 
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