needed help for 4 ft

[weshawn]

Bought my 4 ft tank last year, plants had been dying all the time. Tank was re-setup abt 3 times.
set-up comprises of:

1 PL light (55W x 2 u-turn bulb)
1 FL light (2 x 36W)
2 x 4.8kg of ocean free substrate fertiliser (2inch)
gravel: 4 inch
1 cooler fan
external filter
CO2 cylinder with 4bps
fertiliser: Prolife 2 capfuls every 2 wks

kh: donno
ph 7.5

Plants had been dying n hair algae growing before plants actually started growing.

Steps taken before each setup,
1. washing the canister
2.changing the pipes cos it's full of brown stuff sticking inside it

However I 'm not giving up. I'm going to re do my tank again. I think that my base fertiliser is not enough during the initial set-up. So i will have to take out half of the gravel and wash it. Put in new substrate fertiliser and cover it with the washed gravel. the other way is emptying all the gravel and buy aqua soil for the tank so that i need not buy separate fertiliser.

Guys, any comments? Please help cos I'm quite sad to see each time my set up fails..

[|squee|]

Hi there,

Admire your persistance

Probably your lights are not enough. Some do 200W for a 4 feet tank I think. So maybe you need to invest in a good lighting set ( metal halide? ) first. What plants are you trying to grow?

Have you measured the temperature? You need to get a couple of test kits to test for potassium, iron, hardness, acidity, blah blah.

[theodore]

I have only one piece of advice for you: READ.

The articles section on AQ is a good place to start.

[budak]

use the tank calculators here to check your lighting WPG... i think it's a wee low for a 4 footer... and how does 1 light become 2?

Can't comment on your fert and gravel without knowing more details... ditto on what external filter you use....

Trawl through some recent threads to see that we normally measure CO2 levels by estimating from the KH and pH levels (test kits for these two are vital). BPS is a useless indicator. With your pH, I suspect your CO2 level is much too low (and ammonia level too high).

Prolife fert? Do you mean Profito EasyLife? Without wanting to get into a long story, I suggest you read the "Articles on Dosing" thread in the Aquatic FAQ section for some basic info about what plants need to thrive... Tom Barr's Estimative Index is especially useful and as simple as it gets. In short, plants need nutrients including N, P, K, Fe, micros etc.... along with adequate light and sustained CO2 levels to grow well. If one element is lacking, plants deteriorate and algae gets the upper hand.

Don't bother with the base fert and pipes. Settle on a regular fertilising regime, make sure your lighting is sufficient (aim for 2.5-3 wpg) and your CO2 levels are both high (25-30 mg/l) and sustained (I recommend using internal reactors to minimise CO2 loss). And as theo has said, read up (both here and from good books available at the library)!

[Addie]

Hi weshawn,

I am on the other hand think that your light maybe too strong at this stage where plants are not fully grown yet. I suspect this could be your root cause of hair algae. (you have total of 182W according to my understanding from your detail).

IMO, total amount of light is dependent of the amount of plants you have, inclusive if they are full grown or not. Full grown can take up to the total WPG that mostly recomended by experts. If the plants are not full grown or just newly planted, they will require less light. Again, this is purely my opinio as it works on my 4ft tank where I had hair algae for a while with 240W turn on. The hair algea only grew at the back of the landscape; very few HG in front. I found that I was using 160W at the back and 80W in the front portion. As I have separate switches to control the lights, I was able to turn off 80W at the back and become 160W in total (80W in front and 80W at the back). The hair algae slowly went away.

Of course, the correct proportion of fert. is important . Again, I'm taking the same approach as my lighting in which I dose slightly less than the recommended for the start.

I have now increased my lighting to 240W for a month now and plants do well. I have also occasionally turn on the last 80W to become 320W in total for a few hours when I'm at home. This is still in experimenting. I have also double my dosage of fertilizers. I would say the plants are not perfact yet but most of them are growning well expect the glosso. I think is not enough light.....but I am waiting to see the effect of 320W later.

Like Budak and theo had said, you will find many good articles in this forum which will help you to understand more in a balance tank. BALANCE..... yes, it is the word and it is different from one tankt o another due to different load/type of plants, temp., etc. you have to experiment to find out for your tank. Likewise, I'm learning at the same time finding the "balance" for my tank.

Hope this help and don't give up.... BTW, there is no need redo everything . Redo is the last thing you want to do as it is painful to wash away the base fert.

good luck.

[weshawn]

hi guys,
thanks for the advice..i was too impatient and redid my tank, icluding washing the whole lot, gravel n all. this time kiasu, used 4 pkts of JBL base fertiliser..bought lots of plants from teo...my new tank is fully planted so as to prevent algae..done over the weekend and did till 3am..phew tiring but satisfying..will post the pic one day but don't know how to insert pix into this page....