Lobelia cardinalis melting

[Cristy Keister]

IMHO, you're dosing too much. I would try dosing Flourish on alternate days to KNO3 and KPO4. Iron will probably only be needed 1x/week - if that much - and don't dose it at the same time as KPO4 since they bind together. Then be sure to do a w/c 1x/week.

Too much iron can lead to bba.

.

That really only happens in hard water. I add 10mls of both Flourish and Flourish Iron to my 40 every day. I've even added more in the past. BBA is a co2 and/or macro nutrient issue.

He really does need that much in the way of micros, especially with the Ludwigia. Like I mentioned at the meeting, most people under dose them. A low dose might be OK on a low light tank, but most people need more.

It's a YMMV situation. I've used that dosing method (the EI method) with the most success in my 75g high light tank. And Paul is presumably on the same water system since we're both in Laurel.

[Jeff120]

No, but I would say its the #1 problem most people have. With NO3 and PO4 so high it probably is part of the problem, but most of the time its CO2 related. Im curious to here how you are measuring the CO2 in your tank Paul. Co2 is cheap, crank it up and you will have a lot less problems

Sorry, but there is a question to that. Cranking CO2 is not the end all answer to everything, I don't care that your snowglobe tanks do run clean most of the time.

He's diffusing through an Eheim intake, and it was running 3-4+ bubbles a second easy. I was having trouble counting them.

FWIW - BBA is also from fluctuating CO2 or imbalances of nitrates to CO2 (which would actually be my guess here, if his test is 40-100 ppm), not just low co2 levels.

It is very common in low tech planted tanks with big water changes, because the new water is co2 laden (used to run into that one all the time on another site). Not as common in NPT tanks.. no new water.

[Cavan]

IMHO, you're dosing too much. I would try dosing Flourish on alternate days to KNO3 and KPO4. Iron will probably only be needed 1x/week - if that much - and don't dose it at the same time as KPO4 since they bind together. Then be sure to do a w/c 1x/week.

Too much iron can lead to bba.

.

That really only happens in hard water. I add 10mls of both Flourish and Flourish Iron to my 40 every day. I've even added more in the past. BBA is a co2 and/or macro nutrient issue.

He really does need that much in the way of micros, especially with the Ludwigia. Like I mentioned at the meeting, most people under dose them. A low dose might be OK on a low light tank, but most people need more.

It's a YMMV situation. I've used that dosing method (the EI method) with the most success in my 75g high light tank. And Paul is presumably on the same water system since we're both in Laurel.

The only guy in the Pittsburgh club who ever had problems with iron and phosphate a problem when dosing together was the guy with hard well water. It really isn't usually a problem. It's common wisdom that doesn't usually cause a problem in practice. Likewise, if everything else is in order, you can really dose iron to the extreme and get no BBA.

My personal preference is to not go quite as far as EI when it comes to dosing, but to tailor things to a particular tank a bit more, which can easily be done.

[SCMurphy]

Paul,

Reset the tank;

1) Clean out as much algae as you can on the day you start step 2 and 3.

2) Stop all flow in the tank and apply Hydrogen peroxide directly onto the algae you can't get out of the tank. No more than 40 or 50 ml for the tank. Do step three about an hour after you do this.

3) Do a water change 20-30% every other day for the next week. You can repeat step 2 before each time you do this if you want to.

4) After the week, replace the Filter material, all of it. Clean out the pipes, bleach the intake and outflow.

5) Half the dosing of the macros. Keep the micros the same. Keep the CO2 the same. Do this for a month.

6) Adjust your dosing to suit the tank.

[PaulS]

Cavan, it's the stinky cyanobacteria...

I do have my CO2 cranked pretty high. At least 3-4 bubble a second diffused throug my Ehiem. Although the drop checker indicates I could raise it futher.

I'll give the tank reset a try. I'll trim the back the crypts and the other plants that have a lot of algae. For the trident, can I do a peroxide dip? I'd hate to throw the whole plant away...

[Cavan]

[quote="PaulS"]Cavan, it's the stinky cyanobacteria...
quote]

That means that the nitrates are either really high or really low. I'm betting the former.

If you fill the inside of the drop checker with water of 4 KH, you can have it green at 40ppm of co2. I'd go with what Sean said for now and we can work out a fert plan at the meeting. Using Excel on top of what you'll be doing certainly won't hurt.