timbruun

Why are you adding the salt for africans?

Usually you need to own a piece of land where you're at to get the water tested. You can get it done for free once a year I think it is. I use well water in all my tanks except my shrimp. I keep mostly africans. I do run my water through a water conditionner and don't find any problems. Although now that I started doing planted tanks I did start adding MgSO4 and CaSO4 to the water to bring the hardness up since the conditionner softens it. My problem is also my water has very high KH and no GH to start anyways. Hence the reconstitued distilled water for the shrimp. I do use prime for all my water changes though. Mostly because of the metals aspect since there shouldn't be any chlorine or chloramine in the well. Although some people have shock treated wells with bleach/chlorine to get rid of biological problems and that can cause issues.

You can get iron test kits fairly easily. The best is the health unit test though. They give a biological and mineral test.

I can't see it being sexing at that size. There has to be something else... I assume you use prime or some other dechlorinator when doing what changes?

I have 2x2L hooked up in a Y to the same reactor. So I should put that in the 1.5wpg tank? Along with excel? At what rate? Should I use excel in the 0.5 wpg tank? I'm more worried with that one with the vals that I had melt already.

I thought that DIY CO2 was supposed to last longer than that.

The 1.5wpg tank had an algae problem and I know my water isn't that good. That's the reason behind adding ferts. For the 0.5wpg tank it's more to prevent deficiency than anything. Some of the plants do show deficiencies. I'm still learning/reading what I need to fix each problem. I'm pretty much going by the EI method. Just suiting it to my medium light excel tank and low light no CO2 tank. I've gone over your EI chart many times, don't worry. lol Similar dosing just less per week.

I won't be upgrading my lights anytime soon I doubt. I want to make things grow with what I have and possibly in the future upgrade.

I do have a DIY CO2 ready to go right now. Is it worth running in the 0.5 wpg tank? Or will the plants not usre it at all. I had it going in there earlier to try it out and see how it all works and found it didn't last very long at all and wasn't really that consitent. Not sure if consistency matters with DIY. I have 2x2L bottles hooked to one reactor. Maybe I have a leak if it doesn't last vey long...

How do the red bellies break the heaters? Just by freaking out and running into them?

Now that I've decided to use dry ferts a bit I'd like to mix up a batch ready to go and just use a certain amount of ml of that solution per certain gallons.

I've got KNO3, KH2PO4,K2SO4, MgSO4, Trace. All in dry form except the KNO3 which is 500g in 2L water.

I've also got these from seachem which I don't have to use but wouldn't mind using up and then sticking with dry ferts afterwards. Flourish excel, potassium, iron, nitrogen and comprehensive. Along with seachem equilibrium. The excel and equilibrium I don't want to just use up since I will be using them regularily.

So what I've figured out somewhat is that I'd like to put them in like this once a week per 10 gallons:

1/16 tsp KNO3 or 1.25ml solution

1/32 tsp KH2PO4

1/32 tsp K2SO4

1/64 tsp Trace

I will be using excel in one out of the two tanks as per the dosage on the bottle and possibly DIY CO2 in the other tank. If no DIY then nothing though. This along with 50% WC every week. I will also be using the MgSO4 and CaSO4 to adjust my GH since it's at zero. And actually if anyone knows how much of each to raise GH by 1 dH would be great. I've read I need to use 1:4 of MgSO4:CaSO4 but that's as much as I could find.

The tank that is getting excel is a 90 gal with 1.5 wpg. The non excel has 0.5 wpg. Lighting hours is 10-12 then 5-11. So 8 hours which I will do more as things progress.

Now feel free to give me any info on the above but my real question is how to go about mixing up the solution. Like I said, I would like to be able to use let's say 1 or 2 ml per 10 gallons. I assume it needs to be 2 since I need to have 1.25ml of KNO3 solution. How would I mix this all up in either a 2L or 500ml bottle to have it ready for use over maybe 10 weeks and how much of each. Can some not be mixed? And last question for now, do I still need to add KNO3 if I have a high fish load?

Sorry for the long post. Thanks in advance for the help.

All this talk about balls makes me want to go buy them for my tank.

Little update with the water.Still not sure about the equilibrium. I'm going to try and get a different brand of GH tester and see what happens. I'll keep playing around with it and see. Otherwise I've started using epsom salt and DAP plaster of paris in my other tanks to bring the GH up also. The plaster turns the tank cloudy for a bit but it's supposed to work really well. Plus it's cheap. I tried the CaMg(CO3)2 which is dolomite in a glass of water and it doesn't disolve at all. So I won't be using that in my tanks unless I want to put it in a filter bag in my filter. We'll see.

With my distilled I've been using the baking soda and epsom salt along with a little bit of cichlid salt and still trying the equilibrium. My water stats are still dead on what I want them to be. And as proof that everyone is happy I've got at least 2 shrimp with eggs I'm pretty sure there are more but I just haven't seen them at the same time.

I've actually got a smallish pleco cave that someone could have. It's a 2 piece where the top lifts off the bottom so you can see inside. Perfect size for bristlenose.

I wouldnt' depend on algae eaters to keep the algae at bay. If the algae gets going it will be suddenly on everything in your tank. Or can be. Algae eaters can only eat so much and alot will only do it if there is nothing else to eat.

I agree with bettafishmommy. Keep the lighting around 1.5 or under. Otherwise you might run into problems with algae.

You need to get a liquid test kit instead of the strips. The liquid kits are actually accurate. And you need to do a large water change if your nitrite is at 2. You need to get it down to 0. The find out why your nitrites have gone up. What is your ammonia and nitrate at?

What kind of information are you looking for? The sponsors on this site are very good. I've been to natures corner many times and they're great. Not a huge fish selection like the big stores but they have tons of plants and are very knowledgable.

Interesting. Would a commercial pesticide applicators license be enough?

Didn't think it was publicly trade company... And with the business license. How does help? I have a business license. Do I just tell them that? Business card?

How do you become not the public?

Maybe next time I should just ask for "the old stock" and get it dry. lol

For those of you who buy dry ferts, can you by KNO3 dry? I went to all seasons and they had to mix it with water for me otherwise it was illegal to sell. Is that right? Or is it just because it was my first time buying...

I got it mixed 500g in 2L. So 0.25g/ml.

That's fine then. I guess I figured I'd see soomething that resembled a snail somewhat. Maybe it does if I put it under a microscope?

I didn't think they hatched that small. I guess I don't really know. I'm expecting it to look like more than a dot before it hatches... Is that right?

I'm just wondering if fish eat snail eggs. I've got a few endlers, shrimp, 1 demasoni fry, 1 yellow lab fry with my MTS and ramshorn snails. I noticed egg clusters on the glass and leaves of plants and watch them too see how they are progressing. I'm noticing that they are suddenly gone. Do these fish, shrimp or other snails eat the clusters?

Good to hear the python is working out. Hopefully you can figure out why you're losing fish.

So I tried the equilibrium in a pail before hand to see what happens with my GH. Is it supposed to work right away? I waited up to an hour testing the water regulary and shaking the jug but my GH never really rose. I ended up adding a bit of epsom salt (MgSO4) also and that worked right away.

So does anyone have experience with equilibrium? I don't want to be adding too much GH now that I went through all this trouble. Or does the API kit not test it properly and needs magnesium also?

On another note after all this work my water parameters are dead on and everyone in the tanks looks so much happier than before.

Your best bet is to just pick a complete kit off here or other local sites. You won't need a huge CO2 tank either with only a 20 gallon. A 5 pound cylinder would be plenty and would last quite a while. If you want you could get bigger and it would just last longer. Once you have CO2 you things will take off with enough light and ferts.