How does GeX substrate compare against ADA Aquasoil?

[Panut]

He has replaced it, with amazonia II.
cheers

[StanChung]

Ahh so you've just emptied the tank and this is the gunky mess your left with at the bottom, soil with that little bit of water which is impossible to remove.

So its not because the soil is 'spent' so to say, and its perfectly fine to use again. Or will you replace it?

Hi,
It is said and I've seen with my own eyes and nose[P], a well oxygenated substrate [via plant roots using powersand will not be smelly[rotten egg] if you poked your finger deep in the soil to smell. Ordinary sand+base substrate that's been setup for more than 2-3 months will.

Soil will degrade, and the answer is to top up. i've done more than 2 rescaping of soil tanks and it's a lot of work. removing the fine roots that may rot etc. Finishing up by doing a top up of new soil and gentle 'WIWO'-water in water out. Fresh water in one side and cloudy out the other.

[EvolutionZ]

hi guys.. just some simple comments on mine on ADA and GeX after using it and rescaping the tank using the above 2 soils.

first i'll say about ADA II.

pros : better plants grow.
water clear up faster than ADA I.
less floating junks like wood shreads.

Cons : cloudy problem improved? i don't think so. i got a major water cloudiniess after shifting my bog wood and only stirring up the top layer of the soil. water was so cloudy that i have to stop work for 2 hours before continueing.
cloudy water took 1 whole night to clear.
cloudy water forms even when the soil is slightly stirred at the top layer. the soil looks like as if its 1 year old although i only used it for less than 2 weeks.

thats about it.. i would say ADA I and ADA II not much difference. the only difference i can find is that ADA I's cloudy water took me 3 days to clear, while ADA II need just one whole night.

as for GeX....

pros : very little cloudy water.. or should i say dust water?(GeX 'dust' settle very very quickly)
after even a major rescape, tank was very cloudy.. but it all settled down within around a few hours.
very very few floating junks (e.g. wood shreads)

Cons : after a rescape, the soil will looks kinda dusty..
plant growth not as good compared to ADA II.

the above pros and cons are just based on my own expierence on using the 2 soil.. i would still choose GeX and insert root tablets for better growth. ADA soil simply get cloudy very easily.

my 2 cents. no offence to ADA supporters or GeX supporters.

[StanChung]

That's fair comment and something more than one person here agrees. To each his own.
I do think this thread is already bordering on the repetitive.

[vitaroy]

May i know how many packets of 8kg Gex soil is sufficient for 6x2ft tank base? Also must i add any base fertilizer to enhance the growth rate of stemmed plants for Gex soil?

Thanks!

[illumnae]

Probably 7-8 bags would be needed for a 6x2ft base. base fertilizer is up to you, but i have not used any in my 4x2x2 tank and the plants grow wonderfully. you may want to put something below your base to oxygenate it. as Stan has mentioned, it may have some benefits. however, additional nutrients are generally not needed.

[EvolutionZ]

anyway, just a notice... i find that ADA II cloudiness is even worst than ADA I. recently i just simply uproot some small amount of not really fully rooted Rotala sp and of course, that small part of the tank(just around a 5cm x 5cm patch)
uprooted some soil and i can see a whole lot of milky thingy(what ever you call that) rushed up. den it flow towards my filter outlet and soon, my whole tank was cloudy. i never did expect ADA soil to cause cloudiness so easily. i remembered when i up root the whole fully and deeply rooted of blxya japonica(spreed across the whole of my 2ft tank covered about 2x 1/2 ft of my tank.) when i rooted them, obviously my whole tank turn cloudy. but i can forgive that.. since i uproot a whole lot of blxya.
but this type round just a small patch of unrooted rotala and it cause my tank to be cloudy.
in my own opinion, i don't think ADA II is made to improve cloudiness. its more towards creating more cloudiness.
i should have chose GeX soil, rescaped my 1 ft cube tank and cloudiness cleared within half an hour.

so just to tell you guys, if you have trouble with cloudiness during using ADA I, skip ADA II as to me and to what i see, ADA II is worst for cloudiness.

anyone of you guys have the same expierence with me?

Edit: well, the only good thing about ADA i would say is that the growth is very good. comparing growing Didiplis diandra in 3 soils, GeX, ADA II and Dazs soil. i got the best result in ADA and worst in Dazs.

[vitaroy]

Probably 7-8 bags would be needed for a 6x2ft base. base fertilizer is up to you, but i have not used any in my 4x2x2 tank and the plants grow wonderfully. you may want to put something below your base to oxygenate it. as Stan has mentioned, it may have some benefits. however, additional nutrients are generally not needed.

Thanks for your information!

Very informational and will buy those Gex Soil on coming weekend.

Cheers

[AquaObsession]

Been using ADA II in a small tank (1.5 feet only). No cloudiness at all, no matter how much I uproot. Good plant growth as well.

I use ADA I before, but I always get greenish tint water, not with ADA II.

However, I am no involved in any kind of testing, just random observation.

so far, over my experience, the best I;ve used was Lapis sand with JBL Subtrate. water clears readily

Cheers, Christophe

[kennyseah17]

i just bought the 2 kg to top up more subtrate but after pouring a little.. i realised i bought the bigger pellet size....looks abit weird against my previous small pellet gex...

decided to stop pouring in case I have more problems having to remove it later....anyone here mix the pallets ( big and small) ..

[kennyseah17]

decided to sell the 2kg gex light green ( but I opened it and poured i cup ( about 100gm ) into the tank only to realise its bigger then my previous subtrate..

interested please pm me..sell cheap.

[Aquanoob]

You can sell the remaining Gex green pack at the marketplace. Gex got 3 packaging, red, green and dark green. Red pack is suppose is to be shrimp-friendly, and the dark green pack is smaller grain than the light green pack.

[hayabusa]

good morning guys, i know this is an old thread but forgive me. recently i thought of rescaping my tank and was previously using project soil, i thought of getting a darker substrate so GEX and ADA popped into my mind and i started googling about the 2 products and therefore stumbled upon this thread. i enjoyed gaining so much information from page 1-8, i've never been a GEX or ADA user throughout my aquascapings and i want to give GEX a shot. the thing is that i'm still pretty unsure of which one to get, the dark or light green package? my tank is a 2fter and i thought to myself with such a small aquarium, maybe i should get smaller substrate to make it look "bigger" which is the dark green packaging but afraid if my flowrate would disturb it or my intake would suck it in.

i'm using a 1000L/p canister, and also would smaller substrates mean i would need to get more than usual?

hit me back!
regards

[aquarius]

Go for the bigger sized soil and if you're planting small plants likes glosso or HC, then use a little of the smaller sized one at the top layer for ease of planting.

[aquarius]

This tread is very old but it is Very Informative! Though i've never used soil for my setups before, from the feedback of my friend who bought Amazonia II, he says that his filter cloggs up very easily with mud-like debris in his cannister filter. He then realised that the mud-like debris is actually the black coating of the Amazonia II that "melts" off and ends up in his filter. And he used it for less than a yr! I've seen his tank before and the soil no longer has the black coating but each granule is light brown with rough sand-like texture.

Since alot of people have use Amazonia I, Amazonia II and Gex soil for quite some time now, i would like to find out whether does anybody has this problem with the 3 mentioned soils and if yes, how long did it take before the 3 soils show such issues?

So far i think got about 1 or 2 persons here says that they had this issue not long after they used the Gex soil, though it was only a few granules. Hope to hear your feedbacks.