Good advice.

Interesting you pointed out that in a bucket, if one rots they all rot.

I was having a discussion with Dennis Wong about this a while back. It's also a good reason to remove dead decaying plant material. He had a good explanation of what was actually happening but it was over my head (not surprising!).

The general gist was that decaying/rotting plants can affect other plants close by. Will have to try to find the conversation but can't remember where we were having it.

Oh man, I love the green rasboras!

I've tried to get a good school of them but have had issues with the condition they came in . I did have 3 survive long term and I love how active they are. They're definitely open water fish and don't hide. I'm hoping once I get a good 10-12 of them that they'll encourage the tetras to come out and swim too.

They are a beautiful fish. I haven't been successful getting any good photos since they don't stop moving. Definitely a top dwelling open water fish for sure. Luckily the ones I picked up were very healthy, hopefully you can source some more. I may try breeding them at some point down the road but that's a whole new adventure.

Not a big update, this month wasn't a display oriented month but the tank doesn't look to bad considering. Macros got changed to a MasterLine 2 clone on a whim. Nitrate is already in line with what I was previously dosing but po4,k, and Mg all got slashed. If anyone knows the Masterline 1 micro clone recipe let me know. All I can find is the ppm for Fe which is pretty rich. As you can tell I have been seeing too many "powered by MasterLine" photo's recently and am easily persuaded by marketing. You have to admit it's the best slogan ever for a planted tank.

Most plants are doing very well, a few are trying their best to die. I'm almost convinced Horti lab's "Ludwigia white" tissue culture is just a smaller form of Ludwigia Cuba which is unfortunate that they are trying to pull that off. Going to grow it emersed to see if any variegation shows up.

I forgot how quick Java fern grows in a high tech tank. It's on a roll now so will need to tend to it before it gets basketball size.

What's you n/p/k ratio? I'm trying to figure it out but my brain officially turns off at 5 pm on a Friday.

I'm also stealing "not a display-oriented month" haha I love it

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Previously I was dosing
N8.4 - P3.6 - K14.5 - Mg1.7 / week
50% water change every 4-6 days

MasterLine 2 clone is
N8.4 - P1.4 - K11.2 - Mg0.84 / week

Display-oriented depends on trimming technique. I had a lot of people wanting plants so I chopped the tank up a bit.

Ehh. Non display oriented week for lesser peeps like me probably more likely means the plants are just not behaving and they are looking crappy this week.

It is a great marketing slogan. But here's my take on it.

Those tanks would probably look 95% the same under your old dosing and Masterline. Those guys, and guys like you, get everything else right. That's what most people don't see or understand.

I remember back when your PO4 level with VERY high. Tank still presented itself beautifully.

That being said will be interested to see what differences (if any) you notice.

My guess is that some will love it, and some will rebel a bit. So you end up with a new subset of plants that are at peak health in the current dosing scheme.

I agree 100%, to make maters more complicated I would guess not all are using recommended dosing rates on the bottle. Tropica is a good example of this.

My old soil should be full of PO4 and K at this point so bringing those down isn't very risky. As you have noticed with your soil adventure it's a pretty good buffer for dosing regimes.

I'm still running Fe at about half of the Masterline rate to see if corrects the pinholes on the pinnatifida. Just curious if their micro mix is only Fe rich or overall rich for everything.

Don't you worry I have those plants too! There just hidden because they won't grow. My rotala tulunadensis might be dead, it just doesn't know it yet. Has always had very bad necrosis on most of the plant except the tops but it has started to out pace the growth unfortunately. Probably will need to start over with that one and a few others.

Aren't you due for an update by the way? I always enjoy your tank.

Why thanks! You're absolutely right. I haven't updated in a while. I had some trouble with it in the beginning of this year. The chaotic "winging it" attitude finally bit me and I triggered a tank wide problem. I'll update before the year is over Gotta compose my notes for a huge update

I've mulled over a farm tank for this very purpose -- to stash the problem plants, but nah, that's outta hand for me. Pre-covid, this year, I met up with Chantz Cramer, and being inspired by his work, I started throwing some of them outside in an emersed "farm" just to have a backup so I don't lose em forever. A couple of them has been such a breeze to grow this way. But the downside now is that I have to reconvert them back to immersed and well, it doesn't always take.

@Hendy8888 do you ever test your tank parameters?

I would be curious to know what your in tank measured NO3 and PO4 are.

Just did a water change yesterday but my guesses are:
NO3 - orange
PO4 - blueish green

I'll get back to you with the results in a minute.

Results are in:
NO3 - orange (5ppm?) Was expecting maybe 10? But I have been doing more frequent water changes so that makes sense. For me, yellow = too low, orange = good, red = too high.

PO4 - 0.25ppm? This is a tad lower than usual (normally 1.0ppm) no mater how much I throw at it. Also makes sense since I just reduced P04.

2014 was a good year right?


Also note the tanks daily fertilizer dose went in about an hour ago and the lights just came on.

That's definitely a common misconception people have. Give ferns alot of light/ferts and they really take off once adjusted. I could almost see my Bolbitis growing.

Bump: I didn't know that, so too much FE can cause pinholes.

Guess I should add some context to that...I am guessing something in my micro mix is impeding the K uptake of the pinnatifida. It's showing as a K deficiency but I believe there is enough K in the water (I don't test K). @burr740 gave some insight that he has resolved the self induced K deficiency by reducing micros. Mg can also have the same effect sometimes.

I really can live with the pinholes but why not see if something changes.