# How I do it



## Cavan Allen (Jul 22, 2004)

A few people have asked me how I fertilize and why, so here goes. Mind you, this is merely what has worked (very well) for me.

As an an example, I offer my 40 breeder.

KH is 3 and pH 6.3-6.4. Lots of co2 is a must.

Temperature is usually around 75. A wide variety of plants are comfortable with that and it prevents growth from really getting out of hand.

It has two 96 watt bright kits from AH Supply (excellent customer service from those guys) and a 13 watt bulb in the back giving me a little over 5wpg of power compacts. All bulbs are 6700k. If everything is approached the right way, that amount of light is perfectly manageable.

The substrate is a mixture of Flourite (I had it on hand), SAPS (left over from an outdoor emersed setup), plain sand (from when I had a bare sand foreground area) and a large amount of inert pea gravel.

I have a pressurized co2 system with a Milwaukee regulator and co2 controller. Co2 runs directly into my Eheim 2026 Professional II. I've experimented with a diffusor but haven't really seen any benefit. I like co2 controllers. I just crank up the bubble rate really high and they do the rest for me. No more fluctuation of co2 levels because of changing plant mass or anything like that.

I add 12mls per day of Flourish and Flourish Iron. That sounds like a lot and it is. It is my belief that more people underfertilize than don't. No algae issues. I clean the glass off a bit maybe every other month. Plant growth and color are fantastic. Both are added in the morning along with 12mls of Flourish Excel. I started adding that to make extra sure plants were getting enough co2 and kept with it because things were going so well.

For macros I do the following:

Into 300mls of distilled water goes 3 teaspoons of kno3 and 1 teaspoon of potassium phosphate (obtained from Greg Watson).

Another 300mls of distilled water contains 1 teaspoon of potassium phosphate only.

It took some trial and error, but I add from 5.5 to 6.5 daily of the first solution and 3 of the second. It's kind of hard to articulate, but the amounts of the first solution don't change much and that allows me to make adjustments by altering the second one only. Both are added at night. I'm kind of surprised at how much P I add, but I just go by what the tanks needs and no longer ask why. I don't test unless something looks off simply because I don't like to. If I had to guess, I'd say that nitrates are usually around 20-25ppm and phosphates 2-3ppm.

More P is added if I ever see any GS. A sign of too much in the way of macros is when I see tiny amounts of what I call haystack algae. I believe it's a non-attaching Cladophora. Backing off a bit solves that problem easily. 
Too much iron and I might see some thread algae. 12mls daily of F and FI seems to be safe though.

50% of the water is changed every week.

Good water movement is important! It should be brisk but not overpowering. Plants do much better with a good flow.

Of all the ways I've gone about things over the years, this has by far worked the best. Stem plants grow very quickly and to large sizes. My Ludwigia sp. 'Guinea' (probably L. senegalensis) is especially robust. I have an abundant supply of _C. parva_ that do just fine and spread well without any substrate additives. To their right is a submersed _C. lingua_. It usually only has a few leaves at a time, but it's been plugging away for almost a year. I can grow just about anything in there. Only plants that don't like soft, acidic water don't do well ('Philippine' java fern).

I have an abundant population of cherry reds and Amano shrimp and none seem affected by anything I'm doing. Neither does my swarm of espei and dorsiocellata rasboras.

Giving the plants everything in abundance just plain works. A lot of what I do is based on experience, so I apologize if it's not as easy to understand as it should be. I will say though, that this basic plan has worked for new-to-the-hobby local folks pretty well.

I'd say the only downside is that I have to keep on top of things, but a missed water change or dosing doesn't hurt much.

Questions and comments are welcome.


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

Thanks for sharing. It's always nice to compare notes. Would you mind adding a photo of the tank here? Any idea what your tapwater GH and your tank GH is? Any idea of the Ca/Mg ratio? You probably don't check it, especially if things are doing well, but I'd be interested if you did know.


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## Freemann (Mar 19, 2004)

Thanks Cavan for this.
Strange enough I have come up with the same amounts I add myself on my 108 gal tank, 1.5 ppm NO3 daily 0.2ppm or 0.4 ppm sometimes PO4 all added by dosing pumps so no chance of forgeting, I add 1/16 teaspoon CSM + B x 4 times a week plus 1/16 DTPA iron once a week both in powder form, Mg I add half a teaspoon once every 2 weeks. My water is much harder 13 GH, 8 KH and this may make it much more difficult for this nutrients to be assimilated my NO3 hovers near 20 ppm measured by the colorimeter as you have quessed in your case, PO4 stays around 3 ppm K around 15 ppm, iron almost never reads higher than 0.1 ppm. I have abudant CO2 added with a controller myself and 3X150w MH for 6 hours daily. Plants as in your case grow fine but in my case I am not impressed. There is no algae infestation of any sort but brown dust appears very slowly and has to be taken care of once a week in the few spots (leaves) it appears. Glass gets covered here in 5 days with a slight haze of GD and has to be scrubbed, letting it circle and such makes no difference it will come anyway. Growth of plants is fine but not explosive here, some wrinkling of leaves and such appears sometimes, anubia leaves directly in the light always get some crusty bits of algae on top of them, and green spot appears even with 3 ppm PO4 in small amounts in the glass. Strange enough even a small addition of even 3,2 ppm of K from K2SO4 can drag NO3 down more than 10 ppm in a single day. This kind of leads me to conclude that K is limiting in some way although it is in the water before the addition of this K from K2SO4.
Overall while tank has no algae under this conditions I always feel algae is around the corner but less than it was with 9 hours of the same 3X150w MH. I do smaller WC 30% a week in most cases making sure I remove the mulm I see, evaporated water is replaced with RO water. I have lots of flow 24/7 18w UV plated 50 micron mechanical filters, biological filter you name it.
Maybe it is the hard water that makes things more difficult. But still this comes to prove that different setups act differently. 
Sorry for jumping into your post.
freemann


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## banderbe (Nov 17, 2005)

That's interesting, according to Chuck Gadd's calculator, your solution doses .23 ppm of N per ml to 40 gallons. At most then, you are dosing 6.5ml * .23 = 1.5 ml N per day? 

In my 29 gal. I dose 6 ppm of N per day. When I've tried less, like around 4 ppm, my E. tenellus became transparent and other plants stunted. L. pantanal and L. guinea look like total crap right now.

My water chemistry is similar with KH 3 and GH 5.. I do all the other stuff you do, except I use TMG instead of Flourish. I know you're far better at this than I am.. maybe I'll have to re-evaluate my nutrient regime.. perhaps I am overdoing something. I still suspect my CO2 method may be not working very well.. I place a glass diffuser under a mini 606 pump to create a fine CO2 mist.

I guess the reason I dose what I do is based on the standard EI recommendations made on this forum. I am actually dosing nearly twice the recommended amount, whereas you appear to be dosing less than half the recommended amount.

For 20 to 40 gallon tanks, the post by John N. recommends 1/4 tsp KNO3 three times a week. Using Chuck's calculator, that means in a 29 gallon, dosing 7.82 ppm three times a week for a total of 23.5 ppm. You are only dosing a total of 10.5 ppm per week! I am dosing about 42 ppm per week!


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## MrSanders (Mar 5, 2006)

This is very intresting to compare to Cavan. You described what you add as an excess. However it appears to be lean in my eyes and I have just recently tried such an approach with my 75 gallon using PPS. I am not adding quite as much as you as far as macros but very similar, and my CO2 is turned down for the time being.

What I find as most intresting is that as far as macros go, you seem to be adding enough that it is in excess for the plants needs but not going hog wild and totally overdosing. But then on the flip side your trace dosing just seems like SOO much... I would never imange one of my tanks needing 2ml per gallon/per week of traces! Then again my tanks have never really looked to great  Seems to be working for you, makes me wonder.....

Thanks for sharing


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## Cavan Allen (Jul 22, 2004)

guaiac_boy said:


> Thanks for sharing. It's always nice to compare notes. Would you mind adding a photo of the tank here? Any idea what your tapwater GH and your tank GH is? Any idea of the Ca/Mg ratio? You probably don't check it, especially if things are doing well, but I'd be interested if you did know.


I have some pictures of the tank before I took out the hardscape and made it a farm (for now). If I don't get to it tonight, it will have to wait until I get back after Thanksgiving.

I don't know exactly what my GH is, but it's around 8 or 9. The ratio of calcium to magnesium is about 4 to 1, which I regard as ideal.


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## Cavan Allen (Jul 22, 2004)

banderbe said:


> That's interesting, according to Chuck Gadd's calculator, your solution doses .23 ppm of N per ml to 40 gallons. At most then, you are dosing 6.5ml * .23 = 1.5 ml N per day?
> 
> In my 29 gal. I dose 6 ppm of N per day. When I've tried less, like around 4 ppm, my E. tenellus became transparent and other plants stunted. L. pantanal and L. guinea look like total crap right now.
> 
> ...


I had my friend test my N and P with his Lamotte kits (my reagents are expired) and, as I predicted, N is about 25ppm. P is very high.

Have you tested your levels? I stopped dosing by how many ppm I add a long time ago. There are so many variables involved that I think it's harder than it should be that way. Just my opinion though...

You add TMG, which is fine, but do you add extra iron? I bet that would help.


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## Cavan Allen (Jul 22, 2004)

> But then on the flip side your trace dosing just seems like SOO much... I would never imange one of my tanks needing 2ml per gallon/per week of traces! Then again my tanks have never really looked to great Seems to be working for you, makes me wonder.....


Go for it. 

You'll find that 'luxury levels' of traces can work wonders. Even slightly more than you're adding should help.


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## banderbe (Nov 17, 2005)

Cavan Allen said:


> I had my friend test my N and P with his Lamotte kits (my reagents are expired) and, as I predicted, N is about 25ppm. P is very high.
> 
> Have you tested your levels? I stopped dosing by how many ppm I add a long time ago. There are so many variables involved that I think it's harder than it should be that way. Just my opinion though...
> 
> You add TMG, which is fine, but do you add extra iron? I bet that would help.


I would love to own La Motte kits but I find the idea of spending $60 dollars or however much it is on a test kit hard to swallow.

As for Iron, yeah I dose 3 ml of Flourish Iron daily.

I think based on your post here I am going to back off from the 6 ppm daily to 3 ppm daily. The growth in my tank is still unimpressive so something else must be going on. My tank was amazing all summer long with rapid, lush growth. Then I pulled everything out and re-scaped the tank. Things have never been the same since. Not sure what I changed but I have yet to get back to the kind of growth I was seeing..

One thing I noticed is your mention of aeration.. That's one thing I changed at the rescape.. I got rid of my air pump and air stone.. those used to run at night for about 10 hours. I figured that the point was only to degasse CO2 but maybe other things were allowed to escape the tank..

Anyway thanks for the thought provoking post.. it's had me thinking about this stuff in the back of my mind all day!


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

Not to change the topic, but this is an interesting point about night-time aeration. I wonder if low O2 levels at night lead to poor plant growth. They do metabolize at night, utilizing carbohydrates, consuming O2, and in fact putting on new growth. Low O2 at night could hinder this.


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