I bought a 20 lb bag of Eco-Complete for my 30 gallon planted tank. I also plan on using a liquid fertilizer. Is that sufficient for good plant growth or do I need to add more "food" in the substrate?
I just did a little looking and it seems the formula is 1 pound per gallon for a 1" layer. So if I wanted 3" layer that's 90 lbs of Eco-Complete. That seems like a lot but maybe it's just right. Just wanted to ask before I headed off to the aquarium store. Thank you again.
Hmmm, I am actually quite interested in this thread. Im about to be setting up a 20 Gallon high to replace my 10 gallon (don't worry Im gonna let the 10 gallon run while the 20 is cycling so the fish are safe) and was facing the conundrum with what substrate to get and how much. Seeing that Fluval Stratum worked pretty well in my 10, I was gonna to that but, I can only find the 4.4 pound bags online and i'd need at LEAST 5 bags of that I'm assuming for $16 a pop.
Then I saw the Carib-sea 20 pound bag for the same price as a single bag of the fluval. Is the carib-sea stuff any good? and would I need to use additional ferts like root tabs to keep things growing? I plan on dosing the tank with excel and flourish, Im just talking about the substrate aspect. And now that the discussion has arisen with OP's tank, would a 20 pound bag be enough for a 20 gallon high?
Eco-Complete is a giant waste of money. You could buy a $5 bag of lava rock, take a sledgehammer to it and come up with the same product for a fraction of the cost.
I tried 2 bags of Carib-sea in my 29 and it just gave enough with a very flat terrain. 3 bags would be much better to give it some slope toward the back. It's surprising (to us newbies) how much substrate can be swallowed up in a tank of modest size. I wish in retrospect that I had gone with blasting sand. Much cheaper, and if one is dosing the water column anyway, the benefits of the micronutrients in Carib-sea are, dare I say, negligible?
Please note the different "footprint" between the 29 and the 30!
I used eco complete in my 125 and I probably used the same formula. I forget what it is....it has been too long.
I do have enough to easily plant the plants....but I wish I had a little more. I'd say I have maybe 1.25" in the front and 2.25" or slightly more in the back.
Being mine is a bigger tank its easier spreading out a couple more bags....which I may do soon I dunno.
I guess my point is if it were me Id buy a little more than the formula says to.
Although I don't think you need to be as deep as some people suggest. I see some tanks that look like they have 4 inchs in the front.
Often when you see scapes where the substrate is very high in the back they have used something cheap to build it up before adding the good substrate. Ive seen large rocks used or even media bags full of normal aquarium gravel laid down to create hills with the good substrate on top.
Eco complete is good but not the best substrate money can buy.....but I was doing a 125 and didnt want to 2nd mortgage the house.
My plants grow but now that mine is coming up on 2 years old I have started added root tabs (osmocote) and it is helping.
The deceptive marketing is enough to keep me away from Eco-Complete. I try to not support companies that lie to the consumer.
"Why does Eco-Complete planted aquarium substrate outperform other products? For the same reason that Hawaii, Bali and Costa Rica are famous for lush, exuberant plant growth. The secret lies in rich basaltic volcanic soil which contains iron, calcium, magnesium, potassium, sulfur plus over 25 other elements to nourish your aquatic plants. Eco-Complete Planted Aquarium Substrate is mineralogically and biologically complete, giving you luxuriant aquatic plant growth without nuisance algae."
Your dinner plate contains a lot of these minerals too, but if you don't put some food on it, you'r not going to do too well!
EC is hard to compare to other substrates because you don't know how much you're getting. The bag weight includes the water.
I've done several tanks with ECO....The last one is a 20 gallon.After outbreaks of 3 different kinds of algae,the plants are struggling,barely growing.It only seems to work well after it's been aged and matured.I used Ocote+ root caps too.
the last 2 tanks I used miracle gro and bdbs.one bag of miracle grow did both small tanks,it was 5.49 for a 9 litre bag.I topped with BDBS,9 bucks for 50 pounds.Plants are growing like crazy,no algae.
all three tank have had the same ferts added,the results are day and night.I would never recommend ECO to anyone,but I would recommend MGOCPM and BDBS,and that's all I will ever use in the future.
You really should give the miracle gro and bdbs a try.It's way way less money too.
if you compare it to blasting sand or even pool filter sand
not so pricey when compared to some others (at least when I bought mine)
I dont know about difficult to plant in.... I have no problems with it....and Im a newb.
There are also plenty of pics of tanks as beautiful as yours Nlewis that are using eco complete. Based on that the only difference is price.
My eco complete was growing plants without the use of any root ferts.....Ive never tried it will blasting sand do that?
Don't know if you've got a tractor supply nearby but they've got safe-t-sorb which has very similar cec properties to eco complete and is significantly cheaper in price. People build entire fish rooms using this stuff exclusively.
The one positive I keep seeing for Ecocomplete is a high CEC. I don't believe that either. I'm think it's just flourite with added bacteria and water. Flourite has lousy CEC. It works better over time because mulm builds up.
Flourite, EcoComplete, Blasting sand, can all have great growth, you just have to add the right nutrients. They don't cause algae You just have to decide if you want something to hold your plants or hold them and feed them.
I could rant on ECO all day long....I recently set up a tank with ECO,plants struggle,very little growth,3 different algae outbreaks.it's been about 6-8 weeks.OTH,another tank with plain colored aquarium gravel and mulm,the same plants grow great.both have the same light,same root caps,same ferts.I need to top and replant pretty badly in the one with plain gravel.
sorry for the crappy camera pics,but I just now took them.
MtAnimals if Eco-complete is inert how can it be to blame for your poor plant condition on it since... according to others... it does basically nothing? Just asking.
Exactly my point! It does nothing. It is inert.It's promoted as being "a complete planted tank substrate".I was just demonstrating the difference between ECO and old inert colored gravel.I do have one tank in which ECO is growing great plants,but it took about a year and a half of ferts,root tabs,and fish waste to get that way.
As far as the poor condition of the plants in that tank,I take full responsibility for that.I just haven't found a way for them to take off in that tank yet.But Again,the point is there is no use is spending the extra money for something that's touted to be everything you need in a plant substrate.In my view,it will cause people new to planted tanks to have trouble and be turned away from the hobby,which is bad for all of us.
If I had a place to put that large angelfish in that 20,I would just reboot that tank with MGO and be done with it.
Regardless of post count,I still consider my self fairly new to planted tanks,and I am still learning.
well darn. I just paid $70 for 2.25 gallons of prodibio aquasoil. It is my first tank. If I can find this black diamond blasting grit near chicago, I'm returning that stuff!!!! The internet rules!
Considering how much stuff i need to fill in the slopes where i have paint cans. If i go this route, OP gets a beer on me!
Aquasoil is completely different. It is a complete substrate that does have all the needed nutrients. Eco-complete and things like flourite are inert with high CEC allowing them to store nutrients over time as you fertilize but start with nothing. Sand has no nutrients and no storage capacity. If you stop fertilizing for even a few days your plants will suffer. Just depends on how good you are in keeping to a schedule really.
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