Hello all,
Fairly new member here. I am re-posting a forum question I had over at the SFBAAPS website as I'm hoping for some advice and input from people here as well. Tom already replied to my first question, and I followed up with more info and asking for further advice. Anything anyone can add would be appreciated. Original posting here: sfbaaps
and repeated below:
*********************
Me posting on 6/20:
I bought some PMDD Pre-mix from Alan at the last open house. He told me a good plan was to dissolve it in water (proportions on the baggie instructions) and then dose it at 1 drop per gallon once a day. I understand that PMDD is 1 part each of the macros: Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Sulfate, Magnesium Sulfate; plus the micro-nutirient mix (CMD+Plantex). Seems simple enough. So I used an empty Kent bottle I had, mixed it appropriately and have been dosing my 72 gal one drop per gallon each day (about a capful).
But now as I've researched a bit more and been reading of Barr's EI and various postings about it and also some discussion of PMDD I have found some people saying that for a higher light tank (I'm about 4+watts/gal now) that dosing following the EI system of individual macros every other day, and the micros on the in-between days of that, and some GH at water change, would be better and would allow better control (with the 50% water change each week) vs. the PMDD. Some even said (I think even Greg Watson) that PMDD is best for lower light tanks and not high light for the very reason of better control and the ability to tweak amounts of macros using the EI method of individual macro doses.
But what is the problem of using PMDD each day as Alan has said to and then 50% water changes each week? Seems from Barr's EI article that "over-dosing" some is not too much of an issue as the big change weekly would flush it out. Over-dosing is better than under-dosing (and of course he goes into detail about how overdosing of macros does NOT create algae issues). So, other than perhaps wasting some money by adding more of some aspect of my macros but simply using PMDD instead of individual doses of the macros is there some issue I should be aware of?
Also, related to this: My phosphate levels (based on my cheapo phosphate testing kit) is about 3+ right now. This is way down from 2 weeks ago when it was easily 5+. I've backed off hugely on my feeding (I was overfeeding in a big way it seems) and also brought down my fish load somewhat. My nitrates are about 10-20 now (also having been brought down from 40+ two weeks ago). Knowing this perhaps using PMDD and it's inclusion of phosphate macro dosing is too much phosphate? Or should I not worry about it since I'll be doing the big water changes.
Tom replies on 6/20:
You can add more PMDD+PO4 to account for higher light levels.
Which is pretty much what folks in SFBAAPS started doing about the time it was formed. Some went lean, some went richer, clearly, with 4-6 w/gal, I had better success with richer levels, and if you where a little low on CO2 and had lean levels of say PO4, then adding lots of PO4 switched the limitation to CO2.
But you can dissolve EI into a bottle for 3-4 weeks worth and keep the trace mix separate, then dose daily, see PMDD style dosing for EI:
http://www.barrreport.com/estimativ...accuracy-want-daily-pmdd-style-ei-dosing.html
If you do large water changes, you do not need to worry over testign and higher PO4 at all.
Main thing is to not over dose too much(you have a massive range for NO3 and PO4 etc) and you should easily be able to target 10-30ppm without much issue. You can also taper off as well.
BTW, you had best calibrate the test kit you are basing your entire dosing routine and premise upon
If not, then you are guessing, which means the test kits are not really telling anything that is of much use.
This is particularly true for NO3 and PO4.
Regards,
Tom Barr
Me again today:
Thanks for the reply Tom, and the link. I've spent the last 4-5 days since reading that entire thread and others on your site. Became a trial member there too. Great resource and I look forward to seeing you in August at the open house.
So far I think things are in good shape. I now have two Hagen T5 HO lights over the tank with a total of 4 bulbs, each being 54W. The difference in the light reaching the bottom of the tank of just one of those (108W total) vs. my 4-bulb (144W total) CF fixture was significant. So now with 2 of those T5 fixtures although the total wattage is 208W I get the feeling the lumens is giving me the equivalent lighting of about 4-5 watts/gallon if I used CFs.
So, after a week of dosings of the PMDD Pre-Mix from aquariumfertilizers.com (1 part each of Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Sulfate, Magnesium Sulfate and Plantex CSM+B) at 2 capfuls a day (10 ml, about 2 drops per gallon), keeping the CO2 nice and rich (both a drop checker and my KH/pH tests show me at 25-30ppm there) I'm seeing wonderful growth on practically everything: my myrio and cabomba are adding about 1-2 inches a day and are just gorgeous, my new e. tellunus red cuttings from Boun are growing out a nice red and adding a new leave every day or so, my tiger lillies are coming out with new growth that has a rich red depth to their heretofore green leaves and are also growing at a nice rate, my red ludwigia is adding the biggest and reddest leaves I've ever seen, and even my anubias, which grew really slowly for me before, all added a full nice green leaf this week, plus new roots are evident.
I did yesterday see the slight evidence of some early threads of BBA on some older leaves and found a couple of small spots of BBA I must have missed when I did my full clean-out and rescaping. I cut those leaves off, scraped the glass and treated some surrounding leaves with some excel to play it safe. I also noticed however, some slight greenish spots developing on the front inside glass in one area that may have been the beginnings of either GSA or green slim algae. I'm hoping both these green spots and the BBA was just because of my recent new lighting, new dosings regime and still getting my CO2 injection and dispersement in more consistent order (I also changed a couple days ago from one of those Red Sea CO2 reactors -- Freshwater Planted Aquarium & Plant Care: Carbon Dioxide Reaction Chamber CO2 Reactor 500 --- to a "Bill Hirada special" tapped directly into my eheim's outflow line), plus it was water change time.
In terms of my phosphates as mentioned I've cut back a lot on my feeding and have removed a few fish to get the fish bioload down. My Nutrifin Phosphate testing kit shows me at less than 2.5 now (more of a powder blue result rather than the definite blue or even deep, dark almost black-blue of earlier). You mention, Tom., calibrating the test kit. Not sure how I do that, I imagine against a more expensive and better test kit. Can you recommend a better Phosphate testing kit and source for one? Nonetheless, even assuming this one I have is not entirely accurate relatively speaking my Phosphates do appear to be going down(mostly I'm guessing from the fish bioload being less and the stronger uptake of nutrients from the plants in the stronger light). If I stick purely to the routine of PMDD Pre-Mix mentioned above I'm thinking I'm going to come up short on my Phosphates soon. It'd probably be a good idea to add a bit of that to the dosing regime, no? How much would you recommend I dose for this 72 gal (likely with about 60-65 gals of water actually) if I get the KH2PO4 from aquariumfertilizers.com along with my PMDD pre-mix? Maybe start with 1/8 tsp KH2P04 3x a week?
Thanks again.
******************
Fairly new member here. I am re-posting a forum question I had over at the SFBAAPS website as I'm hoping for some advice and input from people here as well. Tom already replied to my first question, and I followed up with more info and asking for further advice. Anything anyone can add would be appreciated. Original posting here: sfbaaps
and repeated below:
*********************
Me posting on 6/20:
I bought some PMDD Pre-mix from Alan at the last open house. He told me a good plan was to dissolve it in water (proportions on the baggie instructions) and then dose it at 1 drop per gallon once a day. I understand that PMDD is 1 part each of the macros: Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Sulfate, Magnesium Sulfate; plus the micro-nutirient mix (CMD+Plantex). Seems simple enough. So I used an empty Kent bottle I had, mixed it appropriately and have been dosing my 72 gal one drop per gallon each day (about a capful).
But now as I've researched a bit more and been reading of Barr's EI and various postings about it and also some discussion of PMDD I have found some people saying that for a higher light tank (I'm about 4+watts/gal now) that dosing following the EI system of individual macros every other day, and the micros on the in-between days of that, and some GH at water change, would be better and would allow better control (with the 50% water change each week) vs. the PMDD. Some even said (I think even Greg Watson) that PMDD is best for lower light tanks and not high light for the very reason of better control and the ability to tweak amounts of macros using the EI method of individual macro doses.
But what is the problem of using PMDD each day as Alan has said to and then 50% water changes each week? Seems from Barr's EI article that "over-dosing" some is not too much of an issue as the big change weekly would flush it out. Over-dosing is better than under-dosing (and of course he goes into detail about how overdosing of macros does NOT create algae issues). So, other than perhaps wasting some money by adding more of some aspect of my macros but simply using PMDD instead of individual doses of the macros is there some issue I should be aware of?
Also, related to this: My phosphate levels (based on my cheapo phosphate testing kit) is about 3+ right now. This is way down from 2 weeks ago when it was easily 5+. I've backed off hugely on my feeding (I was overfeeding in a big way it seems) and also brought down my fish load somewhat. My nitrates are about 10-20 now (also having been brought down from 40+ two weeks ago). Knowing this perhaps using PMDD and it's inclusion of phosphate macro dosing is too much phosphate? Or should I not worry about it since I'll be doing the big water changes.
Tom replies on 6/20:
You can add more PMDD+PO4 to account for higher light levels.
Which is pretty much what folks in SFBAAPS started doing about the time it was formed. Some went lean, some went richer, clearly, with 4-6 w/gal, I had better success with richer levels, and if you where a little low on CO2 and had lean levels of say PO4, then adding lots of PO4 switched the limitation to CO2.
But you can dissolve EI into a bottle for 3-4 weeks worth and keep the trace mix separate, then dose daily, see PMDD style dosing for EI:
http://www.barrreport.com/estimativ...accuracy-want-daily-pmdd-style-ei-dosing.html
If you do large water changes, you do not need to worry over testign and higher PO4 at all.
Main thing is to not over dose too much(you have a massive range for NO3 and PO4 etc) and you should easily be able to target 10-30ppm without much issue. You can also taper off as well.
BTW, you had best calibrate the test kit you are basing your entire dosing routine and premise upon
If not, then you are guessing, which means the test kits are not really telling anything that is of much use.
This is particularly true for NO3 and PO4.
Regards,
Tom Barr
Me again today:
Thanks for the reply Tom, and the link. I've spent the last 4-5 days since reading that entire thread and others on your site. Became a trial member there too. Great resource and I look forward to seeing you in August at the open house.
So far I think things are in good shape. I now have two Hagen T5 HO lights over the tank with a total of 4 bulbs, each being 54W. The difference in the light reaching the bottom of the tank of just one of those (108W total) vs. my 4-bulb (144W total) CF fixture was significant. So now with 2 of those T5 fixtures although the total wattage is 208W I get the feeling the lumens is giving me the equivalent lighting of about 4-5 watts/gallon if I used CFs.
So, after a week of dosings of the PMDD Pre-Mix from aquariumfertilizers.com (1 part each of Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Sulfate, Magnesium Sulfate and Plantex CSM+B) at 2 capfuls a day (10 ml, about 2 drops per gallon), keeping the CO2 nice and rich (both a drop checker and my KH/pH tests show me at 25-30ppm there) I'm seeing wonderful growth on practically everything: my myrio and cabomba are adding about 1-2 inches a day and are just gorgeous, my new e. tellunus red cuttings from Boun are growing out a nice red and adding a new leave every day or so, my tiger lillies are coming out with new growth that has a rich red depth to their heretofore green leaves and are also growing at a nice rate, my red ludwigia is adding the biggest and reddest leaves I've ever seen, and even my anubias, which grew really slowly for me before, all added a full nice green leaf this week, plus new roots are evident.
I did yesterday see the slight evidence of some early threads of BBA on some older leaves and found a couple of small spots of BBA I must have missed when I did my full clean-out and rescaping. I cut those leaves off, scraped the glass and treated some surrounding leaves with some excel to play it safe. I also noticed however, some slight greenish spots developing on the front inside glass in one area that may have been the beginnings of either GSA or green slim algae. I'm hoping both these green spots and the BBA was just because of my recent new lighting, new dosings regime and still getting my CO2 injection and dispersement in more consistent order (I also changed a couple days ago from one of those Red Sea CO2 reactors -- Freshwater Planted Aquarium & Plant Care: Carbon Dioxide Reaction Chamber CO2 Reactor 500 --- to a "Bill Hirada special" tapped directly into my eheim's outflow line), plus it was water change time.
In terms of my phosphates as mentioned I've cut back a lot on my feeding and have removed a few fish to get the fish bioload down. My Nutrifin Phosphate testing kit shows me at less than 2.5 now (more of a powder blue result rather than the definite blue or even deep, dark almost black-blue of earlier). You mention, Tom., calibrating the test kit. Not sure how I do that, I imagine against a more expensive and better test kit. Can you recommend a better Phosphate testing kit and source for one? Nonetheless, even assuming this one I have is not entirely accurate relatively speaking my Phosphates do appear to be going down(mostly I'm guessing from the fish bioload being less and the stronger uptake of nutrients from the plants in the stronger light). If I stick purely to the routine of PMDD Pre-Mix mentioned above I'm thinking I'm going to come up short on my Phosphates soon. It'd probably be a good idea to add a bit of that to the dosing regime, no? How much would you recommend I dose for this 72 gal (likely with about 60-65 gals of water actually) if I get the KH2PO4 from aquariumfertilizers.com along with my PMDD pre-mix? Maybe start with 1/8 tsp KH2P04 3x a week?
Thanks again.
******************