Wonder-Gro plant tab fertilizer test

[fishscale]

You could ask medicineman. I believe he makes the tabs. They have worked pretty well for me, don't dissolve too quickly and seem to provide a good mix.

[Sponsors]

[medicineman]

Hello.

Thank you for trying one of our products.

Our product consist of part that dissolves and part that do not dissolve.

On general the highlight is actually shown at the current label.
Only N-P-K is shown which is 10-8-10.

The rest are not shown in amount, which is an optional information and not an obligation to state by our local government as well as by US government as an import product for aquarium. This is well shown by how there are many prominent products (not only asian) that did not show content, more else the percentage (though we did managed to show the content by initiative). However they are proven to work well and loved by aquascaping crowd over the years.

It consist of artificial and natural parts as well as excipients (helping agents).

Artificial/chemical part:
- N 10%
- P 2%
- K 10%
- Fe 1%
- Mg
- Mn
- B
- Cu
- Zn
- Cl
- S
- Mo
- Complexing agent
- Binder

Natural part (minerals) :
- Zeolite mineral carrier 25%
- Phosphate (not readily active, non dissolving), Calcium (non dissolving) 35%
- Pottasium
- Magnesium
- Iron
- Binder
- etc
Our various minerals contains a wide range of other elements in macro as well as micro scale. However it is guaranteed that they do not contain heavy metals hazardous chemicals in dangerous level.
We are trying our best in QC and screening the natural part in order to serve consistent quality to our customers.

[Orlando]

Seems to work very well I must say..

[frozenbarb]

As anyone had the problem of snails eating your tabs?

I just found my Spixi snail in my substrate where I had the Tablet and behold in its mouth was the WonderGro Tablet. I was confused and enlighten.

It looked alot like Shrimp food that has melted and the snail was munching on it.
So can't we use shrimp pellets as Root tab? As they decay they produce ammonia and other stuff that plants can use. PMRT- Poor Man Root Tab.

[Kayakbabe]

ha ha ha.. good one! Maybe so... LOL.

An update...
I have neglected the fish hobby stuff for the last couple of month as my lack of posts in this thread show (not my original plan). I also had the CO2 tank run out and didn't notice it until things started melting a little but. Silly me for ignoring things like that. I have not added any additional root tabs yet.
So an update... Both ozelot swords that had root tab treatments faired better than those that did not. They did not 'melt' as much. So the root tabs helped with adverse conditions.

My over all impression of the wondergro tabs...
At first the unknown root tab (I now think it is Dupla brand) produced more new growth in the center. Over the three months, the wondergrow plant is larger overall.

In addition to the pics I've already posted.
I am attaching 2 pics, one I took on 03-01 and then one today at 04-01.

the 04-01 pic is the dark one. (ugly I know with dirty glass and such, but you can see the two plants).

My impression is that the wondergro tab lasts longer than the other root tab.
Maybe it leaches out it's ferts more slowly thus lasting longer?

Maybe this experiment should be repeated under more controlled conditions.

I think I'll just use a combo of both root tabs... hedge my bets.

The root tabs do make differences in the growth patterns over time. I do know from gardening that sheer amount of a nutrient isn't a thing to look for in a fertilizer. It really depends on the plant, the balance of nutrients to eachother and what the plant requires. You can actually retard growth or damage a plant if you over fertilize it or the ferts are in the wrong proportions or lacking something. So sticking with what the fert manufacturer says for dosing isn't a bad thing to do. But if you find a particular fert that works really really well for one species.. it might not be the best fertilizer preparation for a different species.

[Kayakbabe]

Something else to know... when you normally inject CO2 and you have a nice HC carpet in your foreground... if your plants melt a little and the HC start to peel up in a big sheet.. it might mean that your CO2 isn't working like you think it is.

I'm not sure I want to keep the HC anyway. Now might be the time to take it in for a trade in. LOL.

[medicineman]

@frozenbarb,
Perhaps the snails are just looking for extra nutrients.
Other than the N-P-K content, the tablet also consist of minerals like calcium. Snails probably just in search of those extra things they need, to mention one is material uptake for strengthening their shells.

@kayakbabe,
Too bad the tank was somehow neglected. Though I'm glad to find that the tabs work well and somehow it helped the plant to endure hard times better.

[SPC]

Originally Posted by Kayakbabe

Something else to know... when you normally inject CO2 and you have a nice HC carpet in your foreground... if your plants melt a little and the HC start to peel up in a big sheet.. it might mean that your CO2 isn't working like you think it is.

I'm not sure I want to keep the HC anyway. Now might be the time to take it in for a trade in. LOL.

I didn't realize that stopping CO2 injection could lead to plants melting. How are people (and nature) able to grow plants without injecting CO2? Do the plants somehow change their anatomy in a CO2 injected tank?

Steve

[dr.tran]

Forgive me if this was answered before, but how long are the woundergrow tabs suppose to last before replacing it?

[Kayakbabe]

Medicine Man,

Thanks for the consolation. I'm not going to go into any details. I'll just say that family and friends are higher priority in my life than aquariums, house plants and gardens. They all need attention, but when the humans really need attention at the same time... the humans will get it.

I'm glad the wonder-gro tabs helped it too. It was interesting to find that out.

I really don't want to repeat that experiment on lack of CO2, since the tank overall does look pretty "ratty".

Kelly

[Kayakbabe]

Medicine Man,

Just a suggestion if you are still looking for feedback on the wonder gro root tabs.

I like to put a whole tab next to my big plants. But in places were I have a lot of closely spaced root feeders, I like to break the tabs up into quarters and spread them out among the plants.

The tabs do have a relief line on them to make breaking it apart easier, but it doesn't work well at all. I have to use a knife to break the tablets apart. If the relief lines were a little deeper, that would be much easier and possibly make even make it easy to break them by hand. Ideally I could break them apart by hand.

just my 2 cents.

[medicineman]

Feedback noted.
Maybe will be making tiny version if the tab get ever popular enough, capsule-shaped about 1/3 the original weight.

Growth comparison by me.

Watch one of those demanding plant, Echinodorus red flame (the plant at the left-back of the setup) in a 20g tank, DIY CO2 (keeping yeast tank for study), 72W CF lighting, plain silica sand substrate.

Feb 10, 2008


Continue daily dosing of liquid fertilizer (3ml of macro+ and 1ml of micro+) and root+ tablet on the echinodorus.

March 21, 2008
Switched to new bulbs for extra boost of tank overal growth rate


April 21, 2008


Notice the massive leaves, soaring for the surface. Plant has been cramped at the back, competing with other neighboring plants.

[lauraleellbp]

Originally Posted by SPC

I didn't realize that stopping CO2 injection could lead to plants melting. How are people (and nature) able to grow plants without injecting CO2? Do the plants somehow change their anatomy in a CO2 injected tank?

Steve

Many high-light/difficult plants simply won't grow in non-CO2- injected tanks. Some of these plants normally grow emersed rather than submerged, benefitting from the higher CO2 concentration in the air plus direct sunlight.

The secret is selecting species of plants that are appropriate for your setup.

MedicineMan- I'm really looking forward to growing swords with these tabs; how often did you replace the tabs under that Red Flame?

[medicineman]

Up to date (June 2008), a total of 4 tablets inserted under the base of the red flame. The background is just so full of the plant right now with leaves soaring up to water surface.

[lauraleellbp]

I'm having great results with mine, I'm very happy

My E. 'kleiner bar' is flowering, my E. angustifolius put out 7 plantlets in 2 weeks, Bacopa went from 4" to 16" in less than a month, and my E. tenellus is shooting up new leaves like nobody's business! (this is all in a low tech, not CO2 tank). I can definitely tell a difference between the E. tenellus with the tabs and those without.

x2 on it would be nice to be able to break the tabs a little more easily, though- I have to get my hubby to break mine up for me for the smaller plants.