No pearling..

PlantX

Junior Poster
Jan 22, 2009
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Im new to the barr report. Ive be trolling around looking at all the good advice and have taken it but i dont seem to be getting the results some of u have. I have yet to see any pearling.
For starters i have a
100 gallon 58"x21"x24"(inches may be a bit off)
4x55w pc 6500k half pink half white, 2x55w from 7am-6pm, 4x55w 8am-5pm
50lbs co2 bottle hooked up threw solenoid and milwakee ph cotroller, 3-4 bps.
using a redsea 500 reactor and koralia 3(in the process of making toms DIY reactor, thinking maybe my reactor is under powered)
kh 6-7
ph 6.8-6.9 fluctuates
substrate is flourite black
filtration eheim 2217
I dose according to seachems daily dosig chart compesated for 100 gallons
my fish stocke is a little unique
1 gold nugget pleco
1 fire eel
1 ornate bicir
1 king tiger pleco
4 bala sharks
4 gouramis
8 angels
3 SAE
4 nirite sails
1 EBJD
all get along except the king tiger and gold nugget :(
the tank itself and lights have been up and running for almost a year, co2 as been injected for about 1 and a half months, flourite black has been installed for a week now.
Should i expect to wait for 3 weeks for the plants to stabilize before i see any pearling or should it be immediate? also when i do my weekly 50% water changes no pearling is evident for that day either. most plants are doing well, shooting out new leaves every 2-3 days or so, some of my red plants (sry no names but if u need them i can get them) are starting to shoot out new stems but the leavs look like they are curling a bit.
Any advice or areas to look into would be appreciated.
Used to have bba but since co2 and sae's no evidence can be found. ph before co2 injection was around 7.6-7.8(not using test kit using milwakee ph probe).
If i have left out any inof which would help u gurus out on solving this please just ask.

thanks, mike
 

VaughnH

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Jan 24, 2005
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You are very likely to be too low on CO2. I use about that same bubble rate on a 45 gallon tank. Also, you are depending on a pH controller, which is not an effective way to get a 30 ppm CO2 concentration. A much better way is to use a drop checker to get you close to the right concentration, then very slowly increase the bubble rate, while watching the fish every half hour or so for signs of distress, and watching the plants for pearling. With that big a tank you probably need to inject the CO2 in two locations in the tank, to get it distributed to all parts of the tank, plus good water circulation in the tank to help that along.

Seachem's dosing chart is, as I recall, aimed at low light, non CO2 tanks, so it is a very lean dosage schedule. You can do much better with dry fertilizers and the EI dosing method.

Incidentally, to avoid worrying about the pH, which isn't meaningful for a planted tank, just don't measure it. Let the pH be whatever it will be when the CO2 is at the right level.
 

PlantX

Junior Poster
Jan 22, 2009
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Thanks for the info Vaughnh, ill be getting a drop checker today and slowly increase my BPS. Also ill be adding this reactor http://www.barrreport.com/articles/3444-dual-venturi-diy-external-co2-reactor.html powered by 475gph powerhead, ive compensated by adding bigger inlet and outlet tubing. just about finished construction.
as for dosing i think ill be changing over to ei but for now i must use the rest of my seachem line. Would it be reasonable to say that adding extra doses ontop of my curret schedule would make up for my lean dosing?

currently i have about 1000gph running in my system but i do have large bogwood, maybe that could slow the flow, after i add the 475gp powerhead i wont be looking at flow as my problem anymore :)
once again thanks for the advice MUCH appreciated.

mike
 

VaughnH

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There is at least one calculator on line for using Seachem's ferts per EI, and I'm pretty certain it is on this forum, but I'm not sure where. That is a good way to go - fertilizers are all the same chemicals, so just dosing the right amounts is all that is necessary.
 

JLR Plant Newb

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Jan 27, 2009
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Longview, WA. USA
Finally Pearling

I read another thread a week or two ago about co2 and pearling. Sunday when I did my last water change. I installed a DIY CO2 Diffuser using a quiet one 1200 pump into a 2 in peace of PVC pipe and then distributed across the back of the tank with four 1/4 inch lock line jets.

I have a 50 gal tank with 3.2 WPG T8 light and I've been successfully growing a bunch of stag algae and a bit off bba.
Today though my plants were pearling and things were looking good. Granted It's only been a day.

I'm curious though. isn't it hard on your fish to, "just let your PH be whatever if ends up"? Most fish have a range they prefer. Or so I've read. I've read a lot of stuff I've found out isn't true.

Today when everything was pearling I measured

PH: 6.0 (I used a hagen test kit and it's pretty week in this range)
KH: 4 degrees

The chart says CO2 117 PPM (I'm sure this is not true)
I don't have a drop checker.

My fished seemed pretty much OK. Except they seemed to be gasping a bit.

Couldn't we boost out KH to get our PH where we want it. Seems I read if the KH is too high it's not good for the plants.

Anyhow, I'm happy to say I've found lots of useful info on this site and I feel it is starting to pay off.

Thanks for any advise you my have.

Best Wishes!
Justin Reude
 

PlantX

Junior Poster
Jan 22, 2009
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Glad to hear u got some pearling going after all your troublesome algae issues. my CO2 cleared up those problems. most of my fish prefer neutral water and i am wondering the same thing. Such a low ph would have an affect on fish, no?

Ive upped my potassium dosage to 70mlx2 weekly, phosporus 20mlx3 and nitrogen 20mlx3 weekly. my flourish and iron will stay on the same routine and ive upped my bps to 5-6 bps for now. my LFS had to order my drop checker 3 weeks :( so with my doses and using fertfriend i should have roughly during the week 12ppm nitrogen, .7ppm phosphorus, and 16ppm potassium. i basically took the weekly dosage and put it all together to get these figures. i assume ill still be on the low end of the spectrum with all the plants eating it up daily.

For the EI method i think i am going with KH2P04, K2S04, and KN03 for my macros and using seachem iron and flourish for trace elements. i think ill be purchasing from Planted Aquarium Fertilizer if i should go in another direction for dry ferts or if there is a better fert please do let me no.
Thanks again guys.

mike
 

PlantX

Junior Poster
Jan 22, 2009
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ive added my co2 drop checker and within 15 mins it was green, ive also added another koralia to increase flow. The drop check is on the opposite side of my reactor. Upped my bps to about 8-9, lowered my ph cotroller to allow ph to drop down to 6.5. Cleaned off the water stains from my reflectors to help with light. upped my dosages by another 10 ml. Plants seem to be growing better, ive come to the decision that im not going to care much for pearling as long as my livestock and plants are growing very well. will be canging over to ei in 2 weeks. will post some pics soon.
 

PlantX

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Jan 22, 2009
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VaughnH

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Don't worry about pH. Just because you can measure it easily doesn't make it important. Fish are not bothered by pH, just by TDS, total dissolved solids. In a fish only aquarium it makes some sense to monitor pH as an indicator of things going wrong with the water, but in a planted tank, with CO2 injection, the pH is going to vary a lot, and not affect the fish in doing so. Also, you can't reduce the pH enough to harm the fish just by adding CO2 - pH crash isn't possible. Long before the pH could get low enough to harm the fish, they would be dead from suffocation from the CO2.
 

Tom Barr

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Jan 23, 2005
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A Redsea 500 cannot be used to adequately add enough CO2 to a 100 Gal tank, I RS 1000 will, or a DIY, disc etc etc.

This is the issue.
Add more plants also

Regards, '

Tom Barr
 

PlantX

Junior Poster
Jan 22, 2009
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Now i have the redsea in one section and i have co2 going into my eheim in another section, my koralia 2 and 3 push around the co2 bubbles. i have tiny bubbles everywere in the tank, from top to the very bottom and they stay suspended for quite some time after getting churned up by the eheim. i keep increasing co2 into my tank slowly every 2 days watching plant growth and fish and watching my ph lower with respect to what im doing. my ph is going lower each time i adjust so i suspect more is being added when i command. ( i no u say dont use the controller but i find it helps to control the adjustments) my leaves seem to be growing out much larger then the previous week, i could see the size differece between the weeks, its very interesting to me that that happens. im going to probably increase my light from 4x55 to 4x65w not a huge change but i think will help to get to my hairgrass a lil more.

For new additions of plants which plants would u guys recommend in terms of foreground, mid, back? any constructive critismn on my tank would be appreciated, thanks again guys.


mike.
 

PlantX

Junior Poster
Jan 22, 2009
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after tuning my flow, adding another eheim 2217 and adjusting my co2 concentraion i think my plants are finally starting to grow the way i like them,still no pearling but i do have alot of flow going threw there. My plant biomass has been increased aswell. I think my power compact 2.2w per gallon is acceptable for my setup but if i need a lil more please advise. No algae issues either.

i uploaded a video to youtube so u can see the progress so far, ceck it out. YouTube - 100 gallon part 4 also u ca see what i started with i the oldr videos, its interesting to see the development as i increased in general knowledge of the hobby.