At some point the soil in your tank will ran out of nutrients to feed the plants although the time it takes depends on the quality of your soil and the amount/type of plants you have.
Assuming you reach the point where the soil belly up and you start to see plants showing nutrient deficiency, is providing liquid fertilizer such as seachem flourish line on regular basis enough to feed the plants?
How about for certain plants that are heavy root feeders such as staurogyne repens? Do they benefit more if you use root tabs or combination of root tabs and liquid ferts?
Or is it strongly required to use root tabs when keeping heavy root feeders?
Strong recommended to use root tabs for heavy root feeders. Dosing the water column is only beneficial for plants who can accept that form of fertilization. Root tabs last for quite some time so it's rather convenient to fertilize the tank in one shot anyway (:
Otherwise, why did we begin with soil in the first place? (:
For those that take in predominantly via roots system, I would recommend using tabs. Eg. Echinodorous and also cryptocoryne species. Otherwise, as long as you have been dosing ferts in the water column, stem plants and ferns take in via water column. Your soil never runs out of nutrients as they do not take in from that system. I can get by dosing water column with ADA soil for 2 years without problem.
Holy is the Lord, God Almighty ! The Earth is filled with His Glory !
90 x 50 x 50 cm tank: Eheim 2217; ANS CO2 Solenoid with 60mm intense bazooka; Zetlight 6400; Teco 500 Chiller; Borneo Wild Steel inlet/outlet
Ferts: Dry Mixture/Dr Mallicks. Temp: 26 degrees Substrate: ADA Amazonia
Awesome reply and advise guys!
By the way, speaking of ADA soil, there's this power sand that is typically used as bottom layer. Some types offer micronutrients within the sand. I noticed that this is composed of lava rocks. If one cannot afford to use power sand, are crushed lava rocks a good alternative?
Yeah, the ADA power sand is basically porous media to generate more areas for beneficial bacteria to grow in and improve substrate circulation (the "special" versions have additional ferts and additives infused into them).
You can also create your own base substrate using small lava rocks/chips and your own base ferts, so it's just whether you want to DIY or use commercial products.
So does that mean it's another form of biological filter? If that's the case then we are not limited to use lava rocks correct? ceramic rings, biohomme media, any porous material can be a good candidate?Originally Posted by Urban Aquaria
Yes,you can but those material that you mention will increase the cost of setting up.I got my lava chip from c328,one big bag at a reasonable price.
Yeah, if you have spare bio-media then can use those... otherwise like zerofighterx101 mentioned, its usually cheaper to get and use those bags of small lava rocks.
Btw, it'll be good to put the media in mesh bags before laying them as base substrate, helps to avoid individual pieces popping up during planting.
Great point, UA. Thanks for sharing.
Cheers,
U.K.Lau
Regarding additives, ADA line is quite pricey so I'm looking for alternatives. I saw this osmocote plus in youtube but have no idea if it's actually available in Singapore.
Typically, what do you guys use or suggest that isn't too expensive?
IMHO,the old school way is cheaper than ADA,bottom layer dry fert,lava chips and top layer sand.
To replenish fert for root feeder plants get root tabs.
what brand of dry fertilizers do you use? I only use the seachem flourish line right now on my current tank. stuff like those used for ponds are ok?
I used sera floredepot and Dennerle DeponitMix for the base fert if that what you are asking.
Stuff like those used in ponds? I am sorry i dont understand your question.
Pond ferts can be used for aquariums (just scale down the dosages due to the smaller tank water volume, compared to ponds)... but you may need to be careful with their usage when it comes to keeping shrimps, as some sensitive species may not be able to tolerate the higher concentration of ferts.
I just saw online some additives also used for setting up ponds. Although i'm concerned about it's toxicity to plants as UA mentioned.
But if I am using ADA aqua soil which in itself is already nutrient rich, do I still need to worry about putting additives into the lava rocks that I will place at the bottom? I will be dosing liquid fertilizers anyways and possibly throw in root tabs as well.
usually normal peasant like me just use ada amazonia without any additives unlike those "show case" videos.
Just dose liquid fert daily and root tabs is enough.
Yeah, the base substrate layers and additives are just meant to prolong the nutrient content of the substrate... if you don't add it during tank startup, then just dose more water column fertilizers and insert root tabs whenever required, both methods work well.
Just like UA said,additives will prolong nutrient content.I don't add additives to my substrate during initial set up.Every 6 month i will put in root tabs.
Oh btw im not using ADA soil just lapis sand.
What other ways can the substrate be rejuvenated? Would buying old ADA soil be counter intuitive since those soils may be on the verge of total nutrient depletion?
That's also something i'm wondering at. I notice a lot of people selling used ADA soil. I'm not sure if that's a good idea or is there something that other people do with it that I don't know? I mean how can you trust the nutrient contents of it without knowing how heavily it was used before.
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