2ft planted Journal

[torque6]

3 weeks any improvements ?

[PlAnTaNoOb]

monkeyruler90: I did what I did the last time - dosed half the indicated dosage for Oceanfree's super velvet, whitespots away. The spots disappeared within 2 days. All invertebrates survived the medication.

torque6: yup. no more BBA. only algae left is hair algae on the DW with javamoss. I bought 5 more snails (those little guys with spike-like extensions on their shells), and they are very active compared to the zebra nerites. Cleaned all 4 sides of the tank walls pretty well.

I also changed the T5 tubes from 3X10000K & 1X6500K to 3X6500k & 1X10000K. Now I'm thinking of changing one of the 6500k to a osram 8000k, but is a bit reluctant, because of the pinkish hue of the 8000k.

Glosso lawn growing pretty well. In fact, so well that I decided to tear one corner out to plant in my experimental emerse flora vivarium.

Polyserma sunset growing well, but strangely no pink coloration even though there're 2 6500k T5HO tubes directly above them.

I cut off ALL leaves of the java fern. After 3 weeks, many leaflets are growing well. And surprisingly, these new leaves are light green in colour as compared to the usual dark green. It might be because the leaves are still young. Or maybe the plant's adapting to the high light setting it is in.

I also inserted Root Monster all around the tank, and the crypts are starting to grow.

Overall, the left side seems better off without the crypt and blyxa japonica. However, I'm reluctant to remove them, since they're growing so well... Hmm...

Enough of talking. Will post some pics when I'm free after my exams. Almost died completing my thesis for the last month.

[torque6]

monkeyruler90:
torque6: yup. no more BBA. only algae left is hair algae on the DW with javamoss. I bought 5 more snails (those little guys with spike-like extensions on their shells), and they are very active compared to the zebra nerites. Cleaned all 4 sides of the tank walls pretty well.

Good to know all is well, both zebra and bumble bee horn snails belong to the same species, namely nerite. Probably the earlier ones were expose to abit more medication due to your previous week of struggle against various algae. They should resume once a balance tank is achieved.

[blue33]

You might want to check your phosphate level(leftover fish food, bioload and properly overdose of phosphate) and overdose of KNO3 or excess of KNO3, too much light for a 2ft tank, causing BLOOM of algae. Your filter has done a wonderful job.

Cheers

[PeterGwee]

You might want to check your phosphate level(leftover fish food, bioload and properly overdose of phosphate) and overdose of KNO3 or excess of KNO3, too much light for a 2ft tank, causing BLOOM of algae. Your filter has done a wonderful job.

Cheers

NH4 is the issue with fish waste and not inorganic nutrients like KNO3 or KH2PO4 that we are dosing. You might want to read up further on what plants really need to grow.

Regards,
Peter Gwee

[PlAnTaNoOb]

torque6: yup. Probably so. Now I'm left with 5 horned nerites and 2 zebra nerites. 1 zebra died, and 2 went MIA. They're probably rotting somewhere in the tank, but I can't possibly excavate the tank just to get it. The entire floor's been "glossofied", and any movements of driftwood would probably uproot one entire patch.

blue33: thanks for your suggestion. I doubt extra light CAUSES algae. It probably speeds things up, but I don't think it causes it. Anyway, I've revised my fert dosing, and reduced the phosphate level from 1.5ppm to approximately 0.7ppm and nitrogen from 20ppm to 5ppm (since my bioload's very high, now that my tetras are all grown up).

[torque6]

Tracking your fauna in big tanks are like that, sometimes when you have only a couple and they dont appear for a couple of days, we usually rule them out as dead. Nerites have been known to stay in the soil for a few days, just be patience and look out for them.

[blue33]

NH4 is the issue with fish waste and not inorganic nutrients like KNO3 or KH2PO4 that we are dosing. You might want to read up further on what plants really need to grow.

Regards,
Peter Gwee

Yes! Plant do need KNO3 or KH2PO4 but excess of dosing will cause algae bloom. Maybe you want to read this! http://okcaa.org/articles/Nutrient.html . Algae And Excess Nutrients. What i was referring was the algae bloom.

[blue33]

If your bioload is high, you may not need to dose phosphate, your fish food and waste by fish is enough to provide phosphate.

[PeterGwee]

Yes! Plant do need KNO3 or KH2PO4 but excess of dosing will cause algae bloom. Maybe you want to read this! http://okcaa.org/articles/Nutrient.html . Algae And Excess Nutrients. What i was referring was the algae bloom.

No. It does not.

Regards,
Peter Gwee

[torque6]

excess kno3/nutrients do not cause algae, but 1/20 of ammonia will do just that. Its seems hard to erase the old school of thought.

[cardinal]

Thanks bro. Fishes sick? You mean the white spots on the tetras? It's probably due to stress caused by my rearranging of the scape not long ago. I guess it'll probably go away. If not, i'll dose some med.

No if its ich it will not go away. It will spread to the most if not all the fish in the tank soon. Better be safe than sorry. Dose plant-safe and shrimp-safe med. I have tried azoo's anti-white spot solution with pretty good results. No shrimp casualty and no visible damage to plants. Just be careful not to overdose.

[PlAnTaNoOb]

Cardinal: It might serve you well to read the entire thread before commenting. The ich issue has already been resolved. Thanks for your comments anyway.

[PlAnTaNoOb]

Torque: Actually I decided to reduce phosphate dosing, because there's a line of warning at Chuck's Calculator page that says that too much phosphate will cause some problems. Though I don't really know what problems he was refering to.

[torque6]

Po3 cause problems to fish same as having excess nitrate in the water but its not algae related. With the help of the calculator you should be able to derive a balanced dosage for your NPK.

[PlAnTaNoOb]

Update of my tank after my exams. Its so full of vegetation now!

Just look at those blyxa japonica! Compare them to the pictures in past posts!

Look at those glosso too!!!

Lastly... look at those hair algae that grows exclusively on the entire paatch of java moss...... Absolutely disgusting...


Alright! A rescape of the tank is in order. Plan to change to a glass tank.

Probably going low light to lower maintenance. Changing most of the plants. Polyserma Sunset to some crypts; glosso to c. parva; blxya to hair grass or e tenellus; java moss to maybe flame moss or spiky moss; add some wendtiis around.

Selling my plants cheap soon in the marketplace section of this forum. Lots of Glosso, polyserma sunset and blyxa japonica.

[Quincy]

Glad to see you winning the battle over the algae. The glosso look nice and healthy and most of, algae free

[PlAnTaNoOb]

No more BBA, but the amount of hair algae on the moss is alarming.

[torque6]

Quite a fair amount of hair algae on your mosses. Lights dont seem to be enough as glosso looks tall. Other than that, i would say its a pretty well planted tank, just have to figure how to balance the tank.

[PlAnTaNoOb]

glosso are tall mainly because I accidentally, partially uprooted quite a fair portion on the right, but didn't remove them. So most of them have very long roots instead of stem. The left ones are not tall either. The carpet consists of several layers trying to out compete each other for light.

And yes, the moss is covered with hair algae. Probably because of the high amount of light it receives, and its slow growing properties.

I'll probably reduce the bioload to just
2 Rams
20cardinal tetras
5 Oto
5 horned nerites
many many tiny algae eating shrimps from richard.
Is that still too much?