# Which seachem product to buy



## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

A little confused about which products to buy. I found seachem flourish trace on ebay. I do not see anything on their website about this product. I was looking for some regular seachem flourish. I also use excel and the root tabs made by seachem. Can anyone tell me whether I should or need to supplement with the trace and the regular? Thanks.


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

Ah nevermind found my answer, thanks.

http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plants/month.200107/msg00089.html


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## Coralite (Nov 29, 2008)

Saulat, 
Your dosing of various additives will depend entirely on the type of tank you have and what kind of plants you keep. Heavy root feeders like cryptocoryne and eriocaulon can get most of their nutrient from the substrate but other thin stem plants will taker up a lot of iron, potassium and other macros solely through their leaves and the water column.


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

Well these are my plants. Not sure whats going on with my stem plants. I seem to get some nice healthy new growth but the rest of the plant dies ie leaves fall off and stem becomes brittle. I have a 55 gallon planted freshwater about 22 inch depth with 4 28 watt T5 bulbs, 1 10,000k, 2 6700k, and 1 pink freshwater. I do root tabs, excel every other day, and currently kent marine gro which I am switching to flourish once it runs out. The one stem I am not sure the name I forgot but its a little skinnier than the anacharis. Do any other of my plants use the water column. Planning on buying a Co2 tank tomorrow.

Plants

Echinodorus
Hornwort
Water wisteria
Flame Moss,
Crypts,
straight vallis
Dwarf anubias
banana plant
amazon sword
java fern
moneywort
borneo fern (not a water plant but still alive?)
anacharis
Unidentified stem similar to anacharis
unidentified plant (maybe star grass)


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

Oh, my tank pic didnt attach, here is the whole thing. Probly mention one more thing, my growth seems to have slowed, I found a dragonfly nymph I think has been eating my leaves, and my straight vallis isnt really growing.


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## bradac56 (May 9, 2007)

saulat said:


> A little confused about which products to buy. I found seachem flourish trace on ebay. I do not see anything on their website about this product. I was looking for some regular seachem flourish. I also use excel and the root tabs made by seachem. Can anyone tell me whether I should or need to supplement with the trace and the regular? Thanks.


Seachem has the trace product under the Product/Plant/Trace tabs: [ http://www.seachem.com/Products/Planted.html ] to me there isn't much point in it regular flourish will give you the traces you need but what are you using for your NPK ferts?

At 55 gallons buying the Seachem line is going to get costly personally at that size I use dry ferts from [ http://www.aquariumfertilizer.com ] all you need is:

KNO3
KH2PO4
Trace mix (CSM+B, Flourish, or pfertz "M")
Gh booster (for after water changes only)

A half pound of each will run you about $40 shipped and will lost 50x longer.
- Brad


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

I was under the impression it was only needed to dose those chemicals, NPK, if I had a deficiency showing. The dry chemicals make sense, I may have to go with that once my liquids run out. I have only gotten into this hobby about 2-3 months ago. It's a little overwhelming trying to take it all in especially the dosing methods and various fertilizer advice. I purchased my Co2 and regulator today and am currently shopping for a needle valve. 

Is the dry ferts like a powder you can add and does the EI dosing method work with it?

Should I be dosing the NPK? What about iron enriched enriched? My Kent liquid is listed as 1-0-0 which I know the 1 is for nitrogen of 1%. I was using Plant Gro Iron enriched and became scared I would poison the tank with too much iron since I don't have a test for it. This Plant gro says 0.15-0-0 on the bottle and is 0.15% Nitrogen.


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## bradac56 (May 9, 2007)

No you need to dose NPK at least three times a week depending on what regiment you go with (EI, PPS-Pro/Classic, home-brew) especially if your going to do C02 with decent lighting.

Yes dry ferts are in powder form you just need a set of measuring spoons that goes down to 1/16tsp to 1/32tsp it's easy and allot cheaper than buying large amounts of pre-made products. It just comes down to what your comfortable with.

I've never heard of Fe over dosing killing fish and regular water changes will remove allot of the unused ferts for you anyway.

- Brad


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

Wow thanks. My plants look healthy but growth seemed to have slowed I guess that wld explain it. Think Ill do the dry ferts too.


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

This is my Tap water readings. Do you think I need the GH booster? I am ordering these now NO3, KH2PO4, and the CSM+B trace. Once my tabs run out I'll probably order some more from here although not sure which ones, that is months away.

5-10 Nitrates ppm
0 Nitrite
about 150 ppm GH
about 40 ppm KH
about 7.5 PH


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## saulat (Aug 7, 2009)

Still curious if I need the gh booster. Wanted to update too. I received the ferts in the mail and about to read up some more to see how much and when to dose.


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