Garuf
Member
I honestly couldn't tell you about drying out and sieving, I never bothered with that I just used fresh as a cap and filled as carefully as possible.
I concur with mark, the substrate doesn't really degrade all that much see this thread, both are comparable after long period of constant use, both are near identical to what they were like new: viewtopic.php?f=17&t=21794 the dust is already present in the bag with ADA it isn't with florabase, both are nearly identical in hardness the difference is the texture and colour as well as the grading thing.
In response to the ammonia spike, seeding the substrate, using purigen et al and using a mature filter negates the much smaller and shorter lasting ammonia spike you get with florabase. This is using hobby grade kits which at best are untrustworthy, however. It's worth noting that my comparisons are on the old version of ADA's amazonia. The last time I used florabase I seeded the substrate and used a mature filter and tested daily and my kit never registered a spike. I do my waterchanges at start up 50%daily 2 weeks, 50every other day for two weeks, twice a week for 2 weeks then weekly after that, all 50%. I've never used a seeding product, I'm very sceptical about them and anyway a bit of mulm from a filter is cheap. see this post on them: http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/fishless-cycling
I'd be interested to know the root cause of the spike and if the process of drying and then restarting it causes the ammonia spike again, I thought the reason for the spike was the biologically inactive substrate was unable to nitrify the ammonia equalling a spike which would suggest drying would cause a spike but where is the ammonia coming from, presumably there's a depletion. It's something I'd never considered till now.
I concur with mark, the substrate doesn't really degrade all that much see this thread, both are comparable after long period of constant use, both are near identical to what they were like new: viewtopic.php?f=17&t=21794 the dust is already present in the bag with ADA it isn't with florabase, both are nearly identical in hardness the difference is the texture and colour as well as the grading thing.
In response to the ammonia spike, seeding the substrate, using purigen et al and using a mature filter negates the much smaller and shorter lasting ammonia spike you get with florabase. This is using hobby grade kits which at best are untrustworthy, however. It's worth noting that my comparisons are on the old version of ADA's amazonia. The last time I used florabase I seeded the substrate and used a mature filter and tested daily and my kit never registered a spike. I do my waterchanges at start up 50%daily 2 weeks, 50every other day for two weeks, twice a week for 2 weeks then weekly after that, all 50%. I've never used a seeding product, I'm very sceptical about them and anyway a bit of mulm from a filter is cheap. see this post on them: http://www.skepticalaquarist.com/fishless-cycling
I'd be interested to know the root cause of the spike and if the process of drying and then restarting it causes the ammonia spike again, I thought the reason for the spike was the biologically inactive substrate was unable to nitrify the ammonia equalling a spike which would suggest drying would cause a spike but where is the ammonia coming from, presumably there's a depletion. It's something I'd never considered till now.
