# Mixing soil with Eco-complete?



## littleguy (Jan 6, 2005)

Does anyone know if there are any problems mixing soil (topsoil or potting soil) with Eco-complete?

Any personal experience? Scientific hypotheses?

Thanks!


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

I've put Eco-complete as a cap over topsoil with no problems. When I plant and rearrange plants they get mixed together some of course. Longest tank setup with Eco over soil is almost 2 years old and going strong.


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## littleguy (Jan 6, 2005)

cs_gardener said:


> I've put Eco-complete as a cap over topsoil with no problems. When I plant and rearrange plants they get mixed together some of course. Longest tank setup with Eco over soil is almost 2 years old and going strong.


Interesting. Are you going strictly low-tech Walstad style? Or are you dosing ferts? Injecting CO2?

How thick is the topsoil layer? Eco-complete layer?


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

None of my 5 tanks are strictly low-tech. I have about an inch of topsoil covered by 1.5 to 2 inches of eco-complete in 4 of them (the 5th will be redone in that manner soon). I don't inject CO2, but I do use Excel in my tanks with more light. I use less Excel than what the directions call for - I just use it to give the plants a little boost. I do dose low levels of Seachem Flourish and I have been adding extra CA as my snails' shells have been showing signs of CA deficiency. 

My tanks range from virtually no maintenance to moderate maintenance. As I have rather heavy fish stocking levels, I get algae when I feed too much or fail to clean the filters regularly (at least once every two weeks). I have powerheads with quick filters on 3 tanks, and as long as I keep the quick filter from clogging everything works fine. One tank has a HOB filter and the final tank has just a sponge filter. The amount of filtration varies according to the needs of the tanks. 

I originally had one tank with only Eco-complete as a substrate and it did ok. I then read Diana Walstad's book and decided to try a soil layer in a different tank with small gravel as a cap which worked great (except that its hard to plant through the gravel). So, I changed out the Eco-complete only tank to Eco-complete over soil and the plants did start growing better. I've stayed with the Eco-complete because I like the way it looks and I find it quite easy to plant in it.


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## littleguy (Jan 6, 2005)

Thanks for such a thorough reply! It's nice to get such detailed information. And quite interesting that you have sort of a head to head comparison with eco-complete and eco mixed with soil.

This definitely alleviates most of my concerns with mixing the two.

If anyone else has similar or differing experiences I'd love to hear them


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## ultrajamie (Jan 23, 2007)

eco-complete is quite fine... is it too fine? i mean i wonder about sand becoming anaerobic with soil???


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

Eco-complete really isn't that fine a texture, I don't know about sand as I've never used it. The nice thing about the Eco-complete is it is small enough to get the plants into it, but it still holds them down. I just redid my tank that had small aquarium gravel over soil and that gravel was murder to try and plant in. The Eco-complete is much nicer to deal with. I imagine some of the other planted tank substrates would give you good results as well, but I have no experience with them.


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## ultrajamie (Jan 23, 2007)

silica sand / silver sand is too fine though right?


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## Jane in Upton (Aug 10, 2005)

Some silica sands are OK, others are not.

Examples:

"Play Sand". The very fine, light brown silica sand that's pretty cheap and meant for filling sandboxes for kids. This is very fine, and I've used it to CAP a clay underlayer. Because of the fine size, it does compact, and is NOT appropriate to use in a Walstad-style setup.

"Pool Filter Sand". These vary slightly, but are generally a decent choice as a coarse texture is desired for filtration purposes. There are a lot of different colors out there, too. I had one that said it was "#20 grade", and white. I mean blinding white. I suppose some aquascapers would like it as the "beach" area in front of a planted area, but I couldn't stand it, so mixed in some darker sand to cut down on the glare. Plus, it showed off every single fish poop in high definition, LOL! 

I've also used a darker brown pool filter sand with good results. Its probably at the small end of the range of what is OK with Walstad setups. I made sure to use a more shallow layer, though, to avoid risking it getting compacted or becoming anoxic. I also made sure to get Malaysian Trumpet Snails in that tank, to insure some sand layer turnover and mixing.

~~~ Other sand variants:

Blasting Grit. A fellow NE APS member uses a dark colored Blasting Grit called "Black Beauty" with good results. Blasting grit is quite coarse.

Tahitian Moon Aquarium Sand - this is really on the cusp of being too fine for anything but a small tank. I've used it, at NO DEEPER than 1", preferably 3/4" and it seems fine. I would only recommend it for a smaller tank, and again, with a more shallow layer.

Hope this helps!
-Jane


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## Jane in Upton (Aug 10, 2005)

Oh, Littleguy, sorry to get sidetracked, I forgot to address the EcoComplete!

At a recent demo, one person said that they find EcoComplete easier to work with than Onyx, as its denser, and doesn't seem as "floaty" as Onyx or Soilmaster. They do high tech tanks, though.

EcoComplete comes packed in a liquid they describe as "buffered Black Water" with live bacteria. My only concern with it would be the component they use to buffer it - what IS it? The live bacteria are a plus, but a bit redundant with the soil -that's a big advantage of using soil, too. It says it provides all the mineral nutrients plants need, so its not inert, but I wonder about how that would affect algae's ability to gain a foothold. Several of the Walstad-style anti-algae techniques involve keeping iron in an unavailable state in the water column, while the plants have access via their roots. Makes me curious.

Catherine, did you drain out the water the EcoComplete was packed in, or use it as is? You have firsthand experience with this, so I'd trust your knowledge of it. Did you notice any more or less severe algae blooms as the soil settled in, say, in comparison to the inert gravel top layer tanks?

Very interesting thread!
-Jane


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## Tiapan (Jun 14, 2006)

i have done the method with flourite as opposed to eco (just easier to get for me and i like the look better) and i have a tank all flourite and a few now mixed el natural style. what i did was mix a bit of flourite into the soils (like long term root ferts) and then a thin cap (about 1/2 inch) i guess i could have done more but my plants are super super happy. and they definately do better in the soil and flourite mix then just flourite. going to switch the all the way tank when i get the chance.


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

Jane, each time I've purchased Eco-complete it's been in the middle of winter so it freezes. Of course, frozen water expands, pushes the Eco-complete outward and makes lots of little holes in the plastic. The box usually arrives in pretty bad shape since its evidently gone through at least one thaw cycle and the liquid has drained partially out. This even happens when it's double bagged by the shipper. :noidea: Anyway, by the time it's ready to use most of the liquid is gone. I do add whatever liquid is still there into the tank. 

I've had no major problems with algae except in my 20 gallon tank with 65 watts of light and I think that occurred because I didn't start with enough fast growing plants. All my other tanks are lower light (both eco-complete and the one that had gravel) and have shown no tendency to develop major algae blooms, thankfully. I get algae of course, just not the "Rule the tank and take no hostages" blooms.  The plants did establish faster in the eco-complete than the gravel though. The grain size of Eco-complete is probably a lot better for the plant roots to grow through than the gravel. 

I continue to use eco-complete over soil because it works for me. There are undoubtable other methods that would work as well if not better, but I'm happy with the results I get.


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## onemyndseye (May 12, 2006)

i've used Onyx in my 30gallon (Onyx/soil) and it worked well... though I dunno If id desribe it as "floaty"...

it DOES compact though.

I'll be tearing this tank down soon because a tank filling accident has mucked up my subtrate beyond belief ....LOL.. Lots of soil sitting on top of the sand.... the sand and soil have been mixed up quite a bit.

Good plant growth though!  ... If was going to use another comercial subtrate I think it would be Eco.

Take Care,
-Justin
One Mynds Eye


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