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Thread: NO3 Uptake

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    NO3 Uptake

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    Hi All,

    Does anyone know where I can find info on the average uptake of each nutrient per day per plant? Like how much NO3, K etc is taken up in a day for both, slow growing and fast growing plants?

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    No such info as plants uptake of nutrients varies from tank to tank. What you need to do is to dose a complete set of macro and micro nutrients (Commercial liquid fert will do..judge by Fe level of 0.1-0.2)...After you get to this level...check for NO3 level with a test kit..if it is less than 2ppm..dose nitrate by using KNO3 to get it to 3-5ppm or else try dosing more K to see if the nitrate drops over a period of few days..(if nitrate does not drop..some other nutrient is limited and you need to do some investigation)
    Plant Physiology by Taiz and Zeiger

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    Hi Geoffrey,

    Good question, I have the same ?? in my head.

    Just for your reference, my high light 4x2x2 tank consumer about 1.5g of KNO3 a week.

    I understand where you are coming from (to get a general guide on it). In my view, nutrient take up depends on:
    1) balance and sufficient of nutrients (if they are, they will be consumed more)
    2) light
    3) tank size
    4) type of plants
    5) health of plants

    I do not have potassium tester, so, I gauge the consumption through the NO3 take up. That is, if I add 1.5g KNO3 a week, then I add also about 3.5g of K2SO4. Any comments?


    Have fun.

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    ----------------
    On 12/30/2002 2:23:31 PM

    Hi Geoffrey,

    Good question, I have the same ?? in my head.

    Just for your reference, my high light 4x2x2 tank consumer about 1.5g of KNO3 a week.

    I understand where you are coming from (to get a general guide on it). In my view, nutrient take up depends on:
    1) balance and sufficient of nutrients (if they are, they will be consumed more)
    2) light
    3) tank size
    4) type of plants
    5) health of plants

    I do not have potassium tester, so, I gauge the consumption through the NO3 take up. That is, if I add 1.5g KNO3 a week, then I add also about 3.5g of K2SO4. Any comments?


    Have fun.
    ----------------
    Geoffrey: I agree with FC as nutrient uptake depend on plants and growing conditions. Since you have Diana's book. Turn to pg 78 to see her plants nutrient requirement over one month. May give you an idea. Eg. her values for N,P and K are 320mg, 28mg, 160mg per month to suppor 20g of plant growth.
    koah fong
    Juggler's tanks

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    KF,

    I can't. Diana's number are based on 'low tech' setup, right? Uptake would probably deviate alot from our "hybrid setup", where upon CO2 and high light are used to stimulate growth.

    I agree uptake varies from tank to tank. I think also the rate of uptake depends largely on CO2, light and temperature, ceteris paribus. In fact I was looking for someone who has done a measure themselves like what FC has shared. Thanks FC.

    Typically most of our setup are to an extend similiar. Since FC knows that his plants uses 1.5g of KNO3 in his 4x2x2, I could now work out ppm of NO3 per day. I can even compare his number with Diana's.

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    Geoffrey, I would be cautious and not use that number as a standard as nitrate value largely depends on your bioload and feeding. If your bioload and feeding rate is high, your nitrate level would certainly be high and adding KNO3 could lead to nitrate poisoning of your fish and shrimps...[]
    Plant Physiology by Taiz and Zeiger

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    PeterGwee mentioned a good point about bioload.

    In my case, I feed about 10g of dry food a week, that would typically equate about 4.5g of protein. As a rough guess, after fishes consume them, it should end up giving out about 3g of nitrate (after filter processed them). Therefore, for my tank, the plants consume 3g + 0.9g (by adding 1.5g KNO3 = 0.9g NO3 + 0.6g K+) in a week.

    As mentioned before, I add 3.5g K2SO4 (1.6g K + 1.9g SO4) a week. So in summary:
    Total NO3 = 3.9g
    Total K+ = 3.2g

    ***************************************************************

    If you wish to add KNO3, as PeterGwee warned, monitor your NO3 level first. If you do not change your feeding habit and the NO3 level stay consistance at below 3 mg/l, then add KNO3 after water change till you achieve about 7mg/l. Repeat at every water change. Add nothing between water change. This is a very safe way.

    Tell me your tank water's volume (lenght x width x height / 1200), I can guide you on how much KNO3 in gram to add.


    Have fun.

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    ----------------
    On 12/30/2002 10:49:27 PM

    In my case, I feed about 10g of dry food a week, that would typically equate about 4.5g of protein. As a rough guess, after fishes consume them, it should end up giving out about 3g of nitrate (after filter processed them).

    ----------------

    I read this recently, and the rough amount of N available in protein from food is roughly the amount of protien divided by 6.25? Which would mean that your total N would be 0.72g and not 3g.
    Allen

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    On 12/30/2002 7:25:59 PM

    I would be cautious and not use that number as a standard as nitrate value largely depends on your bioload and feeding. If your bioload and feeding rate is high, your nitrate level would certainly be high and adding KNO3 could lead to nitrate poisoning of your fish and shrimps...[]
    ----------------
    Sure thing, not exactly my intention to use the number as a standard but rather to have a feel of the typical range for NO3 needed in a continuum between very slow growing and very fast growing plants.

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    On 12/31/2002 11:52:21 AM

    Sure thing, not exactly my intention to use the number as a standard but rather to have a feel of the typical range for NO3 needed in a continuum between very slow growing and very fast growing plants.

    ----------------
    Geoffry,

    OK I assume you have zero or unreadable levels of NO3 in your tank right? Which is why you want to dose nitrates. The best way to dose nitrates is slowly. Using the calculator, make your stock solution... a good target level is about 10ppm NO3. This is low enough not to stress your fish, but high enough to be readable with most test kits.

    Now start dosing your stock solution so as to increase your tank by roughly 1.5ppm daily. At the end of the week take a measurement and see what are your NO3 levels. Should it be 10ppm, then you know that your tank NO3 uptake is pretty balanced since they have not impacted your NO3 level dosed. Likely it will be less than 10ppm... In which case, you can try and increase your KNO3 level to say 2ppm a day and check for another week.

    Given enough time, you can roughly determine how much N deficit you have in your tank, and ultimately set a dosage which will keep you N low and plants happy.

    One last thing to note is that it is often found with dosing N in a N limited tank, that K becomes the next nutrient limited... so you might wanna consider K2SO4 soon (if you haven't already started)
    Allen

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    Allen,

    I reset my tank after my futile battle with BBA. I don't want to make the same mistake previously by depriving my plants from NO3 to rid algae. Neither do I want a situation where I overdose in this new setup.

    So, since day one I have been carefully dosing only less than 0.5ppm of NO3 daily (~ 15 drops of Dr M's Aqua). It bothers me not knowing whether I have under-dosed or over-dosed. So far plants looks good but unfortunately for all of us, they show sign of deficiency only later if we under-dose and if we over-dosed, it takes awhile for surplus to build up thence resulting in algae.

    Guess your method will help remove that doubt, thanks.

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    Maybe I should share this with you guys on my battle with BBA.

    It seems they started because of my zero NO3 and I further agravated the situation by not dosing NO3 thinking that the little BBA I had initially will die out as a result of N deficiency. How liang some more, don't want to cut. But instead, it exploded!! Every single plants covered by it within a week. Most plants did badly as a result of the starving and the BBA.

    So I started beefing up my plants by giving them their usual dinner lah. That was after the thread "Plants and algae". Plants recovered, but BBA enjoys free meals and grew more rapidly. Find myself cutting away affected leaves everyday until my plants nearly botak!

    So, moral of my plight, once BBA has a foothold, chances of recovery near zero.

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