[shamrock62081]

Photos are spectacular! In complete awe of your tank right now.

 

[Sean W.]

Might as well look at some pics while waiting on the ferts to come in. :bounce:



How's that for pics @Sean W. !? :red_mouth

Much better ... But... here we have yet another new page that is severely lacking on the picture front


Those red Downoi are really doing great. I have moved all of mine to my emersed grow enclosure.

 

[BettaBettas]

Burr;
Tank is looking great as usual, good to see more pictures of it on here now lol !

 

[Greggz]

Stunning pictures as always Burr.

Like I've said, don't know if makes me want to try harder or quit the hobby!:smile2:

I find the first two interesting showing the growth between pictures. And If my tank looked like that, I wouldn't be worrying about getting micros any better.

 

[fablau]

Wow Burr, your plants look great! Did you keep your usual 0.01 ppm Fe from CSM for the past 2 weeks or you already increased that? Curious....

 

[fablau]

Hey Fab - just reading and watching with an open mind and a hint of skepticism.



Mind you, I have not dismissed trace tox as hog wash either. Toxicity is a neutral subject with no emotional baggage in terrestrial horticulture. Proponents of aquarium trace tox have polarized the issue, so we have denialists who are equally dug in. This does not advance our hobby. An open mind and a collective willingness to experiment will get us there. I absolutely LOVE the fact that so many of us are willing to tweak, experiment and roll our own ferts to see what works. Even if these are not all perfectly controlled experiments, if hordes of n=1 anecdotes all begin pointing in a general direction, we have something.



Having played around with my 'Kill Tank' for almost a year, I know that plants look crappy for several reasons. Too much traces is just one reason. CSM+B is a heavy-handed industrial product with a potentially dicey chelator. I can theoretically see it causing problems for people with inert substrates and high degassed pH. The same dose may be far less harmful with aquasoil and pH of 5.5.



For most people, EDTA is not going to cause issues because of the dose at which it is administered and the regular water changes we all do. EDTA is not villian du jour. But Zorfox definitely has an excellent point/s. FWIW, rolling your own traces is easy enough to do (thanks to Rotalabutterfly) that we can easily try it and share results here soon enough.



In my Dutch tank, I am going to continue dosing my 3X Burr traces - CSM+B boosted with Fe DTPA and MnSO4. CSM+B is light in the blend, delivering only 0.045 ppm Fe every other day. Tank seems to be doing well.

Thanks Vin for the extensive reply, I am willing to keep experimenting as well, mostly motivated by the fact some of my plants are still not great, so... I am motivated to try new things until I find the right recipe. So, I am open to any new idea that could help me to find the best one!

As for your current dosing in your Dutch tank, I am curious to know why you are adding extra Mn? How much of it?

 

[burr740]

Thanks all ^^

Wow Burr, your plants look great! Did you keep your usual 0.01 ppm Fe from CSM for the past 2 weeks or you already increased that? Curious....

I went up to around .012 Fe from csmb almost immediately, so yeah about 3 weeks ago, whenever it was.

DTPA has been .02 on micro days, and several .01s on macro days. Nothing exact and for no particular reason. Did the extra dose a couple times on a whim, everything seemed happy so I kept doing it.

The increase in Fe has definitely seemed to help things. Think it was previously a little low.

This still doesnt explain what happened a few weeks ago, why the sudden increase caused a few plants to freak instead of just getting better, as one would expect.

Which is another reason I want to find out if the whole EDTA thing is relevant somehow. That, and the fact that micros have always been so wonky for me.

In theory, it makes a lot of sense and would certainly explain a few things.

 

[PEdwards]

Trying out the Lizard's Tail are you? Have fun with that. Wish I had a picture of the wetland I saw that was covered in acres and acres of the stuff about knee to wait height. Get your scissors ready.

 

[Saxa Tilly]

Thanks Vin for the extensive reply, I am willing to keep experimenting as well, mostly motivated by the fact some of my plants are still not great, so... I am motivated to try new things until I find the right recipe. So, I am open to any new idea that could help me to find the best one!

As for your current dosing in your Dutch tank, I am curious to know why you are adding extra Mn? How much of it?

Responded to you here: Going Dutch with Aquasoil - Aquarium Plants - Barr Report

 

[fablau]

Thanks all ^^



I went up to around .012 Fe from csmb almost immediately, so yeah about 3 weeks ago, whenever it was.

DTPA has been .02 on micro days, and several .01s on macro days. Nothing exact and for no particular reason. Did the extra dose a couple times on a whim, everything seemed happy so I kept doing it.

The increase in Fe has definitely seemed to help things. Think it was previously a little low.

This still doesnt explain what happened a few weeks ago, why the sudden increase caused a few plants to freak instead of just getting better, as one would expect.

Which is another reason I want to find out if the whole EDTA thing is relevant somehow. That, and the fact that micros have always been so wonky for me.

In theory, it makes a lot of sense and would certainly explain a few things.

Well, I am kinda hoping that as well Burr. I will see to open a discussion about all this on the barreport, I'd like to involve Tom on all this

 

[PEdwards]

I move that we create a new standard unit for micro dosing; the Burr. I will bring it before the Planted Aquarium Committee of Weights and Measures and see what they say.

 

[burr740]

I move that we create a new standard unit for micro dosing; the Burr. I will bring it before the Planted Aquarium Committee of Weights and Measures and see what they say.

Lol, it still cracks me up whenever somebody refers to the burr method. It seems to be taking a life of it's own now.

I blame Sax because he's the one who started it last year with his Kill Tank journal on BR

Thats also when I realized maybe I wasnt crazy after all. Having a seasoned vet put it to the test did wonders for my self esteem.

Before that I always felt like the weird guy in school getting funny looks from all the cool kids.

Responded to you here: Going Dutch with Aquasoil - Aquarium Plants - Barr Report

Couldnt help but laugh at this post too. If this was a drinking game and the key word was burr Id be drunk as hell right now!

 

[burr740]

Ferts arrived, water changes and big trim complete.

80% is a loooong way down

More pics and details shortly

 

[Dempsey]

Looks amazing dude. I love water change shots from above. I that L. Aromatica in the back right? I have been looking for that for a while now...

 

[burr740]

Looks amazing dude. I love water change shots from above. I that L. Aromatica in the back right? I have been looking for that for a while now...

Thanks man. Thats Pogosteman kimberly. Similar to aromatica but twice as big, and more of an olive green/purple color

 

[Dempsey]

Well... I guess THAT will be replacing my spot planned for Aromatica! Please let me know when you do a trim or add me to your waiting list??

 

[burr740]

Well... I guess THAT will be replacing my spot planned for Aromatica! Please let me know when you do a trim or add me to your waiting list??

Will do.

And just to remind everyone, myself included, it is against the rules to talk sales outside the sale forums.

I dont want to get in trouble so any sales talk should be done via PM.


This isnt directed at you, Clint. Your post just made me think of something I meant to say the other day when a few folks were asking about something.

Kind of a gray area that I'd rather stay on the safe side of.

 

[Dempsey]

Sorry about that! Thanks for the reminder though. I don't want to get you, myself or anyone else in trouble. Either way, That plant is now on my most wanted list. :grin2:

 

[burr740]

New micros:

I decided to just copy csmb and mix the first batch according to .015 ppm Fe. The Fe is DTPA, and Mn is jacked to have a 2:1 Fe:Mn ratio. Everything else in the same ppm ratio as csmb,

Im not yet confident enough to put all the Fe in the micro mix. So Im keeping additional Fe/Mn in a separate bottle, just like before. This way I can raise Fe or Traces independently.

Gonna start out dosing micros at .015 Fe, plus .03 ppm dtpa 3x a week. For a total of .045 Fe per dose.

Since the tank levels now are basically zero, yesterday I added 2x macro dose and a couple hours later .03 Fe dtpa. Today was a normal micro dose, tomorrow will be back to a regular macro dose, and so on.

Macros are 7 ppm KNO3, 1 ppm KH2PO4, and enough K2SO4 to make 6 ppm total K, 3x week.

1x week after water changes, 7 ppm Mg and 5 ppm K. The tap has 50 ppm Ca and 4 ppm Mg.

* @Christophe , I tested first having everything in the same container and saw no precipitation. Using a small glass jar with about 250 ml of distilled water, and 5 ml distilled white vinegar, I put everything but Fe together, using 500 ML amounts and being liberal with it.

The only thing I noticed is it took the Borax a couple hours to fully dissolve. After that it was crystal clear. Let is sit over night and it was still clear today. So Im just going with it like that.


Also did a pretty big trim:

Before

After

 

[Ben Belton]

Looks really good.