Seachem line and EI?

[hokuryu]

I just realized that I have begun dosing on a suggestion by Tom Barr, but mistakenly used Seachem's dosing recommendations for their line of products - and not based on EI using Seachem (and then reduced by 1/3, per my low light, non-co2 setup - following from this thread).

I will be going to dry ferts for my macros eventually, but as I have the entire line of Flourish on hand, I wanted to try this modified EI using what I have before moving over to dry.

I can try to lookup EI equivalents for Seachem's line, in terms of raw additions of macros, micros, etc., weekly, but off the top, does anyone have or know of a calculator that uses Seachem's line for EI?

Thanks.

[bsmith]

If you have low light and no co2 then I think you would be safe dosing what the seachem bottle says once a week.

There is really no need for mAcro dosing if you dont have a higher tech setup.

Originally Posted by CagoPaul

I just realized that I have begun dosing on a suggestion by Tom Barr, but mistakenly used Seachem's dosing recommendations for their line of products - and not based on EI using Seachem (and then reduced by 1/3, per my low light, non-co2 setup - following from this thread).

I will be going to dry ferts for my macros eventually, but as I have the entire line of Flourish on hand, I wanted to try this modified EI using what I have before moving over to dry.

I can try to lookup EI equivalents for Seachem's line, in terms of raw additions of macros, micros, etc., weekly, but off the top, does anyone have or know of a calculator that uses Seachem's line for EI?

Thanks.

[oldpunk78]

i am dosing as seachem recommends in my low tech tank and it is doing great. dosing ei is for more light + co2.

[imeridian]

The Fertilator could be helpful with this. You can determine what the ppm per dose of the dry ingredient would be and then determine how much of the Seachem product to use to reach that level.

[monkeyruler90]

are you using RO/DI water for water changes? thatd be the only reason you'd need to dose if you aren't going high light/CO2 way.

[imeridian]

The OP's tank isn't exactly low-light, even though he described it as such. As I've been participant in or otherwise followed the other related threads I suggest following the advice of reduced EI.

[hokuryu]

Originally Posted by imeridian

The OP's tank isn't exactly low-light, even though he described it as such. As I've been participant in or otherwise followed the other related threads I suggest following the advice of reduced EI.

Yes, right, Imeridian, I need to amend that - through Hoppy and Tom Barr's help, it looks like I'm currently getting around 40 mmols to the substrate in lighting, and plan to up that to 60 mmols lighting by dropping my light to 6" over the tank (eventually - along with CO2, likely).

Here is what I come up with - thanks for the suggestions, all, and Imeridian, most especially, thanks for the Fertilator link - exactly what I needed.

The "Full EI" would be:
3/4 tsp weekly KNO3, or 4.2 g.
3/16 tsp weekly KH2PO4, or .90 g
3/16 tsp weekly K2SO4, or 1.125 g
3/16 tsp weekly traces

Per Tom Barr's recommendation, I am trying for 1/3 EI, so each of these reduced to 1/3, and by the Fertilator, equivalent PPM for the raw compounds, in a 20 g tank:

1.4 g KNO3, 11.34 ppm weekly
.3 g KH2PO4, 2.77 ppm weekly
.375g K2S04, 10.51 weekly

On traces, if I have understood it correctly, 1/16 tsp = .3 ml traces weekly

According to the Fertilator, the equivalents in the Flourish macros are roughly:

13 ml Nitrogen weekly - 11.33 ppm NO3
47 ml Phosphorus - 2.79 ppm phosphorus
10 ml Potassium - 10.58 weekly Potassium

Does this seem right? If so, I am wondering about the phosphorus figure - at least the Fertilator shows that exceeding the target range of 2.0 ppm. Secondly - close to 50 ml weekly of the phosphorus? That means I run out of the 250 ml bottle in 5 weeks? Yikes! No wonder people just go to their dry ferts!

Can someone please confirm for me that I have thought this through correctly?

Additionally, I planned on using both Flourish comp and Flourish traces for micros/traces, as well as Iron - and will likely just dose here according to to the Seachem schedule, reduced. This would exceed the above figure of a mere .3 ml weekly traces, as even the reduced Seachem dosage (1/3 their dose) is 1 ml weekly Flourish, 3 ml weekly traces. Iron is 3.7 ml weekly.

To recap, here's my Flourish plan until I go to dry ferts, to accomplish 1/3 EI using the entire Flourish line (with more than this figure for traces, iron, per above paragraph); please also note I am going with Tom's recommended 10 ml daily Excel:

weekly:

Flourish Nitrogen: 13 ml
Potassium:10 ml
Phosphorus:47 ml
Comprehensive: 1 ml
Traces: 3 ml
Iron: 3.7 ml
Excel: 60 ml

I'd love to know I'm whacked on this, particularly on the phosphorus, which seems ridiculously high. Anyone, your thoughts are appreciated.

[hokuryu]

Anyone?

I woke this morning to substantial dieback, and though I know this is expected with crypts, I am a bit alarmed. I am also alarmed I have made some errors in reasoning, and going with the above amounts, I will be goosing these plants to death - so any thoughts would be appreciated.

[Left C]

Since the Seachem products are so expensive, I wouldn't dose a whole lot of extra.

People complain that F. Potassium is really weak, but it is near the maximum solubility of K2SO4 in water.

F. Phosphorus is really weak as you have found. Check the following post that I did a while back that compares dry ferts and Seachem's plant line: http://rexgrigg.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=107

I wrote an Office Excel 2003 based Seachem fert calculator that is based on Seachem's dosing chart. Since it is in Excel, it is very customizable. You can use all of Excel's capacities to work with it. http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/f...tor-chart.html

Here are some more comments about Seachem's line and the Seachem Excel calculator. It mentions other functions that the Excel calculator is able to do: http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/ge...-medicine.html

Above, the fertilator calculator was mentioned earlier. Here is another calculator called the FertFriend that may be handy. http://www.fishfriend.com/fertfriend.html

[hokuryu]

Originally Posted by Left C

Since the Seachem products are so expensive, I wouldn't dose a whole lot of extra.

People complain that F. Potassium is really weak, but it is near the maximum solubility of K2SO4 in water.

F. Phosphorus is really weak as you have found. Check the following post that I did a while back that compares dry ferts and Seachem's plant line: http://rexgrigg.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=107

I wrote an Office Excel 2003 based Seachem fert calculator that is based on Seachem's dosing chart. Since it is in Excel, it is very customizable. You can use all of Excel's capacities to work with it. http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/f...tor-chart.html

Here are some more comments about Seachem's line and the Seachem Excel calculator. It mentions other functions that the Excel calculator is able to do: http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/ge...-medicine.html

Above, the fertilator calculator was mentioned earlier. Here is another calculator called the FertFriend that may be handy. http://www.fishfriend.com/fertfriend.html

LeftC, thank you, both for your great calculators and for your thoughts here.

The light is actually 6" off the tank, which gives an estimated 60 mmols at the substrate. I don't think that is truly low light anymore - but then, I don't have any ready calculator to see (I understand the relationship between wpg and mmols isn't linear, and don't know the calculations involved to see what I'm actually looking at in terms of "low" or "medium" light).

At any rate, I did want to experiment with Tom's recommendation to dose 1/3 EI. I do think I'm just going to add CO2, as I have many of the components already in place, and that would obviate the need for the Excel OD regimen (again, I believe - right, Tom or others?). That said, going with the 1/3 EI in Flourish, do the figures above seem reasonable for a 20H tank - to include the 47 ml weekly of F. Phosphorus, or did I mess up a calc somewhere?

[Left C]

As I mentioned earlier, F. Phosphorus is very weak. Hence, the large amount required compared to the other nutrients.

I think that the reason why F. Phosphorus is so weak is because, not too many years ago, phosphate was thought to be one of the prime causes of algae at any level.

[hokuryu]

Originally Posted by Left C

As I mentioned earlier, F. Phosphorus is very weak. Hence, the large amount required compared to the other nutrients.

I think that the reason why F. Phosphorus is so weak is because, not too many years ago, phosphate was thought to be one of the prime causes of algae at any level.

Thanks. It is apparent it's a no-brainer, just ordered Rex's dry fert combo pack, as I will exhaust the Flourish macros very quickly.

I also dug up my old brewing CO2 regulator - dual stage, ran a bank of draft lines with manifolds, think it will do fine. I've also got a mini-elite for a reactor, which I'd like to try, so I need a sub-unit of check valve, solenoid, needle valve and bubble counter. I've contacted both Rex and Sumo, don't know if either does subsystems like this, but would like to go this way.

Paul

[imeridian]

Sergio from SuMo helped me out with the solenoid and needle valve when I had a regulator already. He made sure that I had all the necessary fittings and even sent the assembly pipe-doped for hassle-free installation.

[Left C]

Originally Posted by CagoPaul

... I also dug up my old brewing CO2 regulator - dual stage ...

Paul

Paul, I really like dual stage regulators. It is what I use. I do not have any single stage CO2 regulators (anymore ).

[hokuryu]

Thanks for the contributions, all. Imeridian - thanks, I contacted Sergio. LeftC, I should have said, "dual gauge..." LOL.