[jfynyson]

In your dosing scheme what's meant by water change at start up on Sun Tues & Thurs vs water change only for Sun?

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[UDGags]

Out of curiosity....are you adding additional Mg or is there a ton in your water? It looks like all of it is coming from you CSM+B dosing. I actually add epsom salt with each micro dosing (3x per week). Then again, I strictly use RO water so I need to reconstitute it myself.

I use tap water and I'm in the Miami Valley Aquifer. http://www.mcohio.org/water/ (water quality reports on right)

Our water’s Average Hardness is 157 mg/L
(ppm), which equals about 9 grains/gallon

Our water’s Average Total Alkalinity
(as calcium carbonate) is 81.5 mg/L (ppm)

So I assume there is some Mg but I've never actually measured it. I might have found the value somewhere in the past...will need to look back over notes/journals if I posted it previously. I'm pretty sure I found the value before....just don't know it off the top of my head. Mom and son are still in hospital so don't look for me to answer this anytime soon Right now I'm home for a bit feeding the dogs and fish and than I'm back to the hospital.

In your dosing scheme what's meant by water change at start up on Sun Tues & Thurs vs water change only for Sun?

When I started the tank up I did water changes three times a week. Now I normally do one water change a week unless I'm battling algae then I increase it to two.

 

[jfynyson]

Can you tell me why you chose to dose your extra iron (extra on top of the iron from your micros) from the Iron chelate 11% as well as Ferrous Gluconate sources ?

What extra benefit do you see for each source and why are you dosing at those particular concentrations ? The EDTA version should be fine for you with the pH you're running at when CO2 is flowing, right ?

Readily available versions as you know are as follows
Iron Chelate 10% DTPA
Iron Chleate 11% DPTA (why this one ?)
Iron Chelate 13% EDTA
Ferrous Gluconate (why this one as well ?)

 

[plantbrain]

I'm a dad! Meet the newest aquarist!

Congrats!


Much more important and time consuming than a tank!

 

[dewalltheway]

First things first...congrats on being a daddy! It is the greatest thing in the world.

Secondly...I just came across your journal and noticed you are in Dayton so it is great to see a fellow Ohioian on here and with a great tank to boot!

Your plants are gorgeous, great job. Will subscribe to keep up to date.

 

[UDGags]

First things first...congrats on being a daddy! It is the greatest thing in the world.

Secondly...I just came across your journal and noticed you are in Dayton so it is great to see a fellow Ohioian on here and with a great tank to boot!

Your plants are gorgeous, great job. Will subscribe to keep up to date.

Thanks! Where in Ohio are you?

 

[UDGags]

Can you tell me why you chose to dose your extra iron (extra on top of the iron from your micros) from the Iron chelate 11% as well as Ferrous Gluconate sources ?

What extra benefit do you see for each source and why are you dosing at those particular concentrations ? The EDTA version should be fine for you with the pH you're running at when CO2 is flowing, right ?

Readily available versions as you know are as follows
Iron Chelate 10% DTPA
Iron Chleate 11% DPTA (why this one ?)
Iron Chelate 13% EDTA
Ferrous Gluconate (why this one as well ?)

Honestly, the extra iron doesn't hurt anything so at best it might help. I don't have any proof it does or doesn't. I was just following recommendations by Plantbrain/Tom Barr. It would be hard to prove one way or another especially with all the other variables in the tank.

Plantex has EDTA iron so I add DTPA and ferrous gluconate so I have the three major ones covered It's a 4:1:1 ratio and then 5:1 for boron. I know Tom has a paper discussing it over on his site if you're a member.

 

[dewalltheway]

Thanks! Where in Ohio are you?

Fredericktown.....about 50 miles north of Columbus

 

[UDGags]

Fredericktown.....about 50 miles north of Columbus

Cool, I haven't found anyone local into planted tanks yet....still hoping someday I will.

 

[jfynyson]

I want to thank you again for the trimmings I got from you back in June. The L.Aromatica is amazing and the Atlantis is beautiful too. Both took about 3 weeks to take in my tank for some reason but now grow like weeds! I love them.

For some reason I've tried the L.Repens Red Hybrid I got from you in several different areas (higher current, lower current, higher light, lower light) and cannot seem to get them to thrive like the others. A couple stems have one of two very small side shoots with tiny roots and the main stems seem to grow a little taller but not many leaves stay on them and the bottom of the stem turn black and it acts like it needs to be cut off or it'll die. I have had root ferts under them the entire time as well (started with aqua fertz then switched to osmocote plus a month ago).

I absolutely love the look of the L.repens red in your tank and how the top 3 inches look in my tank. Could you offer any tips on what else I could try to get it to thrive in my tank ? Thank you even if you don't have any suggestions. I have all of my tank parameters (very detailed) on my profile page if that'll help:
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/yourtanks.php?do=view&id=8353&n=jfynyson

 

[UDGags]

I want to thank you again for the trimmings I got from you back in June. The L.Aromatica is amazing and the Atlantis is beautiful too. Both took about 3 weeks to take in my tank for some reason but now grow like weeds! I love them.

For some reason I've tried the L.Repens Red Hybrid I got from you in several different areas (higher current, lower current, higher light, lower light) and cannot seem to get them to thrive like the others. A couple stems have one of two very small side shoots with tiny roots and the main stems seem to grow a little taller but not many leaves stay on them and the bottom of the stem turn black and it acts like it needs to be cut off or it'll die. I have had root ferts under them the entire time as well (started with aqua fertz then switched to osmocote plus a month ago).

I absolutely love the look of the L.repens red in your tank and how the top 3 inches look in my tank. Could you offer any tips on what else I could try to get it to thrive in my tank ? Thank you even if you don't have any suggestions. I have all of my tank parameters (very detailed) on my profile page if that'll help:
http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/yourtanks.php?do=view&id=8353&n=jfynyson

Glad to hear the trimmings have worked out for you. Your tank specs look fairly similar to mine. The only differences are substrate, I probably have a bit more light and maybe EI ratios. L. repens will become redder with low nitrates, high phosphates and high iron supposedly. I definitely have the high phosphates and and high iron in my tank. My nitrates aren't super low though.

I suppose it's also possible the lighting spectrum of your LED's could be the issue. What's your custom layout from buildmyled.com? I think their original freshwater planted version didn't have green so the colors looked a bit weird to the human eye since that's the range we see.

 

[jfynyson]

I suppose it's also possible the lighting spectrum of your LED's could be the issue. What's your custom layout from buildmyled.com? I think their original freshwater planted version didn't have green so the colors looked a bit weird to the human eye since that's the range we see.[/QUOTE]

The BuildmyLED lights I have are what they now call their "10,000K" (highest PAR levels & same as their previously known as "Planted Tank Spectrum"). The colors of everything including the reds look awesome to me. The reds that are there are very vibrant I have no issues with the colors but for some reason these do not seem to want to root like everything else. The L.Aromatica & Atlantis act like they're on steriods not not sure why the reds are not.

So, I pulled them out of the substrate a week ago, tied a sandwhich tie to the bottom of the stems while grouping about 3 stems, then used a small stainless chain link on the tie to anchor them down. The stems are just above the substrate and in one week I already see more rooting / side shoots than in the past few months combined in the substrate. This seems odd to me.

Any thoughts on that ? Maybe I'm heading in the right direction but not sure...

 

[UDGags]

Your substrate is inert if I remember correctly so they are getting more nutrients from the water column then the substrate. I use aqua soil so I have a better nutrient base in my substrate.

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[UDGags]

I put in 57 more amano's the other day....trying to get this hair algae and tank under control....when I post the next picture it will look a bit different :/ Learned my lesson on what not to do

 

[jfynyson]

I put in 57 more amano's the other day....trying to get this hair algae and tank under control....when I post the next picture it will look a bit different :/ Learned my lesson on what not to do

By "what not to do" you don't mean have a kid and neglect the tank I hope ....ha ha ha. I'm just now getting my algae situation under control before my little girl is due in late Oct early Nov ! I algae issue stemmed from reducing my ferts by 75% I believe one single week.

I always want to learn and usually prefer by others mistakes before I do them myself:wink:...

 

[UDGags]

By "what not to do" you don't mean have a kid and neglect the tank I hope ....ha ha ha. I'm just now getting my algae situation under control before my little girl is due in late Oct early Nov ! I algae issue stemmed from reducing my ferts by 75% I believe one single week.

I always want to learn and usually prefer by others mistakes before I do them myself:wink:...

This is what I THINK my issue was....

Yes, I neglected my tank for a couple months but I compounded the issue by doing a VERY large trim and moving things right before the baby was born. This lack of plants mass with the same amount of fertz, CO2, etc. gave me a lot of excess nutrients and I think my nitrate levels went up. This caused some of the shrimp to die off and my current hair algae issues.....or I suppose I might have missed some doses and it was lack of nutrients....that time was a bit fuzzy for me.

In the future I'll stick to trimming sections every week or getting slower growing plants.

When I say neglected, I mean not trim weekly and not be up to snuff on water changes on a regular basis. I basically did them when I had time every 1-2 weeks. This led to overgrown plants and poorer than I like water quality.

 

[Idrankwhat]

congrats on the birth of your daughter. It's an amazing gift. Like all things now you'll have to live by a good regimen of schedules so you'll find a place to fit your tank duties in and get it back where it should be. Then you can cultivate your daughter's passion for the hobby right along side you.
Stay vigilant!

 

[UDGags]

congrats on the birth of your daughter. It's an amazing gift. Like all things now you'll have to live by a good regimen of schedules so you'll find a place to fit your tank duties in and get it back where it should be. Then you can cultivate your daughter's passion for the hobby right along side you.
Stay vigilant!

Thanks ....its a boy, Gavin.

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[jfynyson]

Have the Amano's arrived to do their duty ?

 

[UDGags]

Yeah, I got them in this past Tuesday morning. Tanks looking better but still not the greatest. I've been out of town the past couple days for the holiday weekend but plan on working on it some tomorrow. I want to remove a couple plants and spread some others out....going for something a bit different Once it's complete I'll post some more pictures.

A couple of my anubias are flowering under water though for the first time, which is pretty cool.