Lushgrow Micros Dosing

[victri]

Hi,

I just finished up my Lushgrow Aqua and started on Lushgrow Micros (without the NPK, which I dose separately). Just curious about how much you guys with high-light tanks add per week (pls state tank size). Do you use the Fe as a gauge?

I'm considering upping the daily dosing to add about 0.5ppm of Fe weekly to my tank (4.5wpg), but am a little worried about overdosing the micros. Currently, I supplement more Fe with Flourish Iron. I have that wonderful excel worksheet to help with the calculations.

ps: if anyone has any good articles on the effects of overdosing micro-nutrients, please pass me the links. I know stuff like copper can be lethal with high amounts, and I would like to get more in-depth knowledge on that.

[geoffrey]

Victri,

Perhaps you want to try dosing the equivalent in content you get from LGA with your LGM. Then slowly work your way upwards to 0.5ppm. Diana Walstad's book has a good chapter on how water plants act as water purifier and it also covers toxicity of heavy metal. You may want to borrow it.

[victri]

Thanks! I'll go take a look through her book.

Actually, the main reason I'm asking is because I noticed LGA and LGM has different composition (g/L) and the % (ratio) of each element is different, for example:

Assume I dose to achieve approx 0.5ppm Fe weekly,
For LGA -
- iron Fe : 0.490ppm
- copper Cu : 0.007ppm
- manganese Mn : 0.177ppm
- boron B : 0.091ppm
- zinc Zn : 0.026ppm
- molybdenum Mo : 0.011ppm

For LGM -
- iron Fe : 0.513ppm
- copper Cu : 0.006ppm
- manganese Mn : 0.137ppm
- boron B : 0.012ppm
- zinc Zn : 0.015ppm
- molybdenum Mo : 0.005ppm

I won't be able to mimick exactly the dosage I was previously dosing with LGA. For most of the elements, I guess the difference should be negligible, except for boron, the difference is quite obvious. Now I just need to find out if any of the metals are near the toxic level. I should think not, but I want to be safe. I'll do as you suggested, raise the dosage slowly over the next few weeks and observe how it affects the plants and livestock.

[PeterGwee]

Don't forget about the weekly large water changes if you are afraid of buildup due to overdosing. Personally, I went up to 15ml 3x a week on my 20 Gallon (15 gallons of water) tank with 72w PC lights for 2-3 weeks with no issues nor algae growth but I see no improvement in plant growth or colour hence I back off to save money. I am now doing 5ml 3x a week...Traces are subtle in effect and takes runs of 2-3 weeks to notice any difference. During the trial run, you need to make sure that your CO2 and macros are in good shape or else the results might not reflect the truth.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[victri]

[quote:3bac7666df="PeterGwee"]Don't forget about the weekly large water changes if you are afraid of buildup due to overdosing. Personally, I went up to 15ml 3x a week on my 20 Gallon (15 gallons of water) tank with 72w PC lights for 2-3 weeks with no issues nor algae growth but I see no improvement in plant growth or colour hence I back off to save money. I am now doing 5ml 3x a week...Traces are subtle in effect and takes runs of 2-3 weeks to notice any difference. During the trial run, you need to make sure that your CO2 and macros are in good shape or else the results might not reflect the truth.

Regards
Peter Gwee [/quote:3bac7666df]

Wow, that's a lot that you're dosing. Are you referring to LGA or LGM that you're dosing? Btw, can I also ask how much (in terms of ppm) are you adding for PO4 and NO3 weekly? I just added another light recently, and am monitoring for changes in PO4 and NO3 taken in by the plants.

50% water changes are a weekly routine. NPK and CO2 are also set. My plans are to increase LGM dosage every 2 weeks, and observe the growth till I run into problems (touch wood) or feel that I've reached a comfortable point. My goal is to cut back on my Flourish Iron supplement, and have LGM provide all the Fe needed for the tank.

[PeterGwee]

I'm using TMG...

Adding more light is going to give you more headaches and less room for error in terms of fertilization and CO2. Since you are doing 50% weekly water changes, you are better off dosing 3x a week.

5-10ppm of NO3 from KNO3 3x a week...less if you have more fish and more if your bioload is light.

1ppm of PO4 from KH2PO4 3x a week

LGM....No too sure but you can try 5ml per 20 gallons of water or lesser. Unless you really go overboard, the Cu is not going to hurt you. 5ml 3x a week I feel should be safe enough. The effect is really subtle....you seems to love red plants from the comments you made on Gomer's tank..huh? Its not really the traces but keeping it high along with K, PO4, CO2 and lower light(2wpg-2.5wpg is good enough...uptake is slower and things do not get bottom out as far as 4.5wpg. :P ) while keeping the NO3 dosage low will give you redness which is from anthocyanin. Be careful of the low end though...it can kill your plants if you go overboard plus loads of algae issues.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[victri]

Yeah, I always have problems getting plants red. I added the extra light to get better light distribution over the tank and not so much for the higher wpg. I used to have a 2x55w PL over the middle of the tank, and I find my stem plants all leaning forward towards the light as they grew. If the 4.5wpg accelerates growth to much, I'll switch the 2x55 to 2x36 and it should make things more managable.

I have an auto-doser for the traces, set to dose everyday. NPK I split to 3x weekly from KNO3 and PO4. I think my NO3 level is ok, and my livestock load consists of mainly only 20+ boraras, some cherry shrimps and a few otos (3ft tank). I don't feed a lot. PO4 a bit on the low side. In total, I dose only about 2ppm weekly. I'll try to up that slowly. The only algae I have now is usually some green spot on the glass.

Thanks for the suggestions.

[geoffrey]

I used to have a 2x55w PL over the middle of the tank, and I find my stem plants all leaning forward towards the light as they grew.

Victri,

Even if you use a 2x55PL and spot them exactly in the middle of the tank, plants are going to lean towards it still. It's futile because the sides of the tank are less bright relative to the centre of your tank. It has to do with coverage instead of intensity here. Plants have this affinity for more light and will point to the brighter spot. It's the same as seeing your plants point towards the window in the morning even when your room is bright. If you can get your tank evenly covered with light, they should grow upwards.

[victri]

[quote:c6ff21789f="geoffrey"]

I used to have a 2x55w PL over the middle of the tank, and I find my stem plants all leaning forward towards the light as they grew.

Victri,

Even if you use a 2x55PL and spot them exactly in the middle of the tank, plants are going to lean towards it still. It's futile because the sides of the tank are less bright relative to the centre of your tank. It has to do with coverage instead of intensity here. Plants have this affinity for more light and will point to the brighter spot. It's the same as seeing your plants point towards the window in the morning even when your room is bright. If you can get your tank evenly covered with light, they should grow upwards.[/quote:c6ff21789f]

That's exactly what I was experiencing. That's why I got the extra light, so I can push the 2x55w to the back, and now the stem plants in the background are growing upright, and not leaning towards the middle of the tank and shading those plants there. I use the new light for the front. The overall coverage/distribution is very much improved, and there aren't any more dark corners.

Thanks a lot, guys! This thread has been very educational. Now I've got a lot of testing and monitoring to do.

[Plantbrain]

Although perhaps fun in some people's minds, testing for Fe is not needed nor would I suggest a hobbyist do it even.

Main things to test: CO2 very carefully and well, and NO3 perhaps.

These are the two more critical things that cause most of the issues for folks.

I am unaware of any toxic effects from traces on plants some have said trace effect their shrimps etc, but it's not known if this really was the issue or not. But if the shrimp can handle 5-6 mls in a 20 gal every other day, they are fine. It's unlikely you will ever need more than that for your tank.

This is a reproducible method for adding a known amount of traces for dosing(x amount of mls per unit time), test kit measurements are not.
Cheap kits cause lots of issues for folks, be careful to double check.

Regards,
Tom Barr

[victri]

I don't exactly trust some test kits too much. I'll be adding measured doses and monitoring how the plants react to the changes.

I feel much better now about my worries over the toxic levels, but I'll still play it safe and do only small changes every few weeks.

Thanks again.