# My experiences with the PPS and EI method



## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

I think most folks mix up 1 tablespoon of CSM+B with 250ml of water and dose according to tank size. I dose 15ml of this solution in my 75g tank with about 2.75wpg. 

As far as test kits, it is very important that you get a good pH and KH kit if you are using CO2. Some will suggest you get a NO3 and PO4 kit also. The beauty of EI is that you don't need to test your NO3 and PO4 levels. You already know that you are adding a certain amount of each fertilizer each week. This amount is over and above what the tank should be using for the week. Half of what remains at week's end is taken from the tank with the 50% water change and you simply start over adding the ferts again. 

You can always add slightly more of KNO3 and KH2PO4 than recommended, there is no set amount. Play with it and see how the plants grow. Just try and only change one thing at a time and give it a week or two to see results before you change something else.

The fish should be fine with your dosing...


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## Edward (May 25, 2004)

MatPat said:


> The beauty of EI is that you don't need to test your NO3 and PO4 levels. &#8230;
> You can always add slightly more of KNO3 and KH2PO4 than recommended, there is no set amount. Play with it and see how the plants grow.


How do you proceed without test kits?

Thank you
Edward


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## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

You simply don't test. It's quite easy to not test.

http://www.barrreport.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1

I believe you have referred to it as the dump and flush method many times Edward


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## stcyrwm (Apr 20, 2005)

Edward,

If you do a 50% water change every week then you can always estimate mathematically what the maximum levels are in the tank. You can do the math by hand or enter the formulas in a spreadsheet. 

For example if you start with a mythical dose of 10grams (for math simplicity)of something per week. You then divide that by 2 (50% water change) which equals 5. Then you're adding 10 again the second week = 15. After WC =7.5 then adding 10 = 17.5. After WC 17.5/2= 8.75 +10 =18.75/2=9.375+10=19.375/2= etc., etc. 

You can see from the formula that if you carry it out far enough you max out at just below twice the amount you dose at. The only other twist is that in the real world you'll be lower because of plant uptake but if you are dosing on the high side this doesn't become an issue.

Hope this helps, Bill

You can use the same mathematical ideas with other dosing and water change percentages but 50% water change seems like the simplest.


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## Edward (May 25, 2004)

Hi MatPat
How does one know if more KNO3 or PO4 is needed?

Thank you
Edward


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## frozenoak (Jul 30, 2005)

Edward, I am assuming (and hoping) that the look of the plants will tell you if you need to increase the amount of fertilizers. If this is incorrect someone please tell me.


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## |squee| (Feb 3, 2005)

I believe whether or not to add more KNO3/KH2PO4 depends very much on how fast you want growth to be, or how much minimum your plants need to grow at a "just-nice" rate so algae doesn't have a chance at growing.


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## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

Edward said:


> Hi MatPat
> How does one know if more KNO3 or PO4 is needed?
> 
> Thank you
> Edward


As you already know, EI dosing is based on dosing to excess, or more than the plants need based on uptake rates.

In your dosing method, you state that a good range for NO3 is in the 10-30ppm range and PO4 is in the 0.1-2ppm range. How hard is it keep your levels in this range without testing?

Since this was Frozenoak's thread, if you, feel this needs to be discussed more, why not move this part of the discussion to its own thread so we do not steal Frozenoak's thread?


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

frozenoak said:


> I am aware that rapid changes to an aquarium is hard on fish. When I get my ferts from Greg Watson should I immediately dump the required amount into the tank or do I need to add them slowly and build up to the concentrations that I need?


Nope, add them right into the tank. I add the poweder directly, some dilute in water first, some make solutions and dose mls.

You can also use test kits and adjust EI accordingly to whatever the range of nutrients you like to target. No rule against that either.
I often do not listen to my test kits, I listen to my plants.
Then I go back when the plants are happy and see what levels things are at.

Before suggesting EI I suggested this about a decade ago:
http://www.sfbaaps.com/reference/barr_02_01.shtml

Folks where more skittish about dosing, but more folks had trouble testing and using junky kits, did not calibrate the test kits etc.
You'll note the more conservative amounts also back then.

Folks already where doing water changes so using that to make dosing easier for their already existing routine made things much easier.

PPS can use Test kits of not, you can do large water changes with that method and you can also not test by doing that.

The main difference is that PPS uses solutions much like PMDD, EI typically uses dry teaspoon measurements except for Traces.

Otherwise they do the same thing and both can be done with or without water changes over extended peroids, with or without test kits and Excel spreadsheets.

You can easily use PPS's SS and PS etc for dosing EI.

PPS/EI and any dosing routine that produced good plant growth has excess nutrients levels for a given growth rate. Otherwise you'd have poor plant growth and algae.

If it's a little excess or a lot, it does not matter as the upper ranges for the nutrients are extremely high except CO2/NH4.

Plants make the best test kit anyway, I change my dosing routines based on them much more than a test kit reading.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Edward (May 25, 2004)

plantbrain said:


> You can also use test kits and adjust EI accordingly to whatever the range of nutrients you like to target. No rule against that either.


_The Estimative Index of Dosing, or No Need for Test Kits 
by Tom Barr, 20050125

*Suggested EI test kits: * 
pH	Pinpoint pH monitor(much better), Red Sea low range(cheaper)
KH	Most all test kits are decent such as Tetra/Sera etc.
NO3	LaMott(much better), SeaChem(cheaper)
GH	Same as KH
Fe	Hach(much better), Sera or SeaChem(cheaper)
PO4	Hach(much better), SeaChem(cheaper)
K+	Aquarium Landscapes, Lamott_
References



plantbrain said:


> The main difference is that PPS uses solutions much like PMDD, EI typically uses dry teaspoon measurements except for Traces.
> Otherwise they do the same thing and both can be done with or without water changes over extended peroids, with or without test kits and Excel spreadsheets.


Can EI run high light aquarium with CO2 for a year without a water change?



plantbrain said:


> You can easily use PPS's SS and PF etc for dosing EI.


 EI does not include Ca, Mg and K2SO4 management. Please see abundant EI threads and http://www.sfbaaps.com/reference/barr_02_01.shtml for reference.

Details









Thank you
Edward


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

Edward said:


> Can EI run high light aquarium with CO2 for a year without a water change?


EI is not designed for no water changes on a high light tank, test kits can and have been used to address fewer water changes in the past.

Back up a second:
I thought "no water changes" was *not the focus of PPS*, now you say it is?

So what advantage does PPS offer if not avoiding water changes then?
It's not better plant health or growth.

EI non CO2 can be done for many years without water changes, but it's not EI then, just estimating without water changes on the lower side to relieve limitations rather than excess dosing and water changes.

No test, no water changes, seldom needs pruning, highly stable.

The old method I suggested years ago(sfbapps site) with test kits does and has been done for over 2 years without any water changes in a high light tank, same as your claim, but it was a *decade prior* with excellent success. Dave Gomberg has not done one for over 2-3 years now and faithfully offers huge bags of plants regularly.

You can view the ignored response to that example on the PPS discussion thread.

Steve Dixon did not for many months. We all agreed in SFBAAPS that the tank does look better *with* the water changes, than without and trying to extend things out further. Sure, you can do it and have it look decent, but in every case, it was better with frequent water changes, especially if you are planning to do contest and need to whip a tank into shape after a peroid of neglect(something every aquarist does). We had this discussion on the APD, locally, many have over the years.

PPS in that context with respect to water changes+ testing and adding KH/GH, is hardly new.

SF tap water is RO like and we added the needed KH/GH, which is why I discuss it if it's lower than a given amount.

Those levels and suggestions where based on group consensus, not just my personal measurements. I've said religiously that GH and KH should be maintained at 3 degrees or higher.

So where are suggesting EI does not address this?
You piece meal burbs without the rest of the story............

How about this blurb:

"I would move on to NO3 from here although Ca and Mg are very important components of GH. Many fertilizers add this or at least Mg. You can add SeaChem's Equilibrium for this to get it up to about 4-5GH. It adds both Ca and Mg and K and Fe too. You can also add Calcium carbonate to get equal amounts of GH and KH but this lacks Mg."

Seems to address both Ca and Mg to me.
Worm your way out of that one.



> EI does not include Ca, Mg and K2SO4 management. Please see abundant EI threads and http://www.sfbaaps.com/reference/barr_02_01.shtml for reference.


Sure does, says to add SeaChem Eq etc if the GH in the tap water is low, why add something if you simply do not need it and it's present in the tap?
See above.

There is no need for K2SO4 either.
That I know.
Why might I know that?

I've been doing it for the last 5 years without any issue and dramatic Amano like plant health and growth. Steve Dixon first suggested this almost 10 years ago and started trying it. I've also played with a variety of K+ dosing routines using K2SO4. As has the entire SFBAAPS group, this is not merely me talking about this, this is 20 folks who have been dosing K2SO4 for the last decade. Not to mention the many folks on the web I've helped over many years. I've not found any evidence of Mg nor K+ issues during this time.

Maybe I'm just very lucky? Hardly.........

Also see here:
http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=21033

I have no trouble growing Tonia and so called hard to grow stem plants or more eclectic items. So if I need K2SO4, why are my plants doing great?

If the person has high fish loading, then they might need some K2SO4, but that is even rare with folks having full overloaded Discus tanks that bred.

Details









Thank you
Edward[/QUOTE]

Water changes can be extended out if desired to several weeks some slight tweaking(slowly lowering the dosing amounts and waiting till any negative growth appears, then bumping back up to that previous dosing amount/volume), there is no rule that WC's *must be done weekly*. Likewise testing can be done to extend that out further if desired(a year or more in high light CO2 enriched tank). I know of a couple of folks that have eyeballed it that long.

There is no rule that says water changes cannot be done with PPS either as well as testing etc.

Dosing also can easily be done 2x a week on lower light tanks and more frequently as more light/CO2 is added.

If you dose more frequently, say daily PO4 vs once a week, I think you'll find a difference in high light tanks. Say add 2ppm once a week vs adding .666ppm 3x a week.

But better control without test kits can be done with more frequent water changes.

CO2 is highly addressed with EI also(not to mention anyone that ever reads my post as I nag them about adding more CO2, it's a rather ironic statement coming from you), it's not addressed in your advice on the APC's PPS in many cases where folks are having issues and most are CO2 related. The record shows that when several PPS users where having issues, you focused on the nutrients when it had nothing to do with nutrients.

I know because well, lots of experience and knowledge about algae as well as plant health, they can tell me the tank's condition and direction when test kits cannot.

CO2 is 95% of the plant growth and algae issues folks have. Many on the PPS tank's posted here have CO2 issues, not dosing issues. In order for folks to get a fair analysis of PPS, they need to focus much more on maintaining a stable high CO2 level. The same is true for EI.

If anything, PPS and EI both isolate CO2 as the dependent variable.
Still, PPS is not different as you say, than the old Rec levels and dosing with or without water changes. It does add some liquid fert solutions in a nice format and nice dosing for a number of tank volumes(kudos there) but dosing dry is easier for many. You are about a decade behind.

..........the poster's question, was answered directly.

Regards, 
Tom Barr

www.BarrReport.com


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## stcyrwm (Apr 20, 2005)

Edward,

I'm beginning to get the sense that you know the answers to the questions you are asking and I'm wondering what's up with that? 

Bill


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## brad (Jul 10, 2005)

Tom's rebuttal is still on the old thread and should be moved here too.


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## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

stcyrwm said:


> Edward,
> 
> I'm beginning to get the sense that you know the answers to the questions you are asking and I'm wondering what's up with that?
> 
> Bill


You too Bill 

He knows the answer and that is why I asked that the thread be moved. You notice my initial request to have it moved was ignored. Only when I said that I wanted to discuss my experiences with PPS and EI did the thread get moved.

To be on the fair side, my first request could've simply been missed during the heat of the exchange.

Either way, there was just no sense carrying on with it in someone else's thread. There was no attempt to lend a hand to frozenoak only to rebut the EI methods I was talking about. Enough ranting from me, the thread has been moved and that was the important part.

Now, for my experiences with PPS and EI. Hopefully someone will be willing to give some advice 

Here is my thread from my brief time using PPS:

http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=6747

I removed all of the spreadsheets a while ago since they were taking up some "valuable" attachment space on this site. I hope to be adding some more pics in the near future. The last spreadsheet contains my dosing/testing results from Day 1.

I am curious as to why I had the below list of problems using PPS when the tank was visibly algae free for nearly 6 months using EI? Please note that I only included the 6 months in lived in Ohio. I moved to Ohio in December and I used EI for nearly a year before I moved and had similar success for most of that time also. Here is the list of problems I encountered during my shourt 6 weeks with PPS:

P. stellatus stunting (complete stand) with 40-60ppm of CO2 and nitrates in the 12-15ppm range...

Appearance of Green Spot with 2 ppm of PO4 and good CO2 levels...

Decrease in pearling at day 13 with good macros and CO2...

Appearance of Staghorn Algae with good macros and CO2...

Melted tops on Lobelia cardinalis 'Dwarf' with good macros and CO2...

One other thing I did not mention in my post was the stunting of my very nice stand of Nesea pedicellata! I did not see the need to mention it at the time since I was giving up on PPS...no need to beat a dead horse.

The Nesea still has not recovered. It took me about 3 months to get it nice (little to no evidence of previous stunting and having it stunt was the last straw, along with getting the Discus of course. There have been several branches that have developed without stunting in the last week or so, about 2 months after switching back to EI. Another month and I think they will be back!

I think most of the above problems are attributed to either low NO3 or low CO2. Most of my reading were in the low range according to PPS stardards.

The only positive difference I saw in using PPS versus EI was that my L. aromatica got a very nice red coloration. However, it seems as though this plant gets red when starved of nitrates, even though my test stated 9ppm (8.8ppm actual, the spreadsheet rounds up) of NO3.

The major changes in tank dosing from EI to PPS were:

A decrease in daily NO3 from 1.72ppm (EI) to 1.14 ppm (PPS)
A decrease in PO4 from 0.5ppm 3x/wk (EI) to 1ppm per week (PPS) 
A decrease in traces from 15ml every other day (EI) to 1ml per day (PPS)
An increase in K dosing from 1.08ppm (EI) to 1.52ppm (PPS)
An increase in Mg dosing from )ppm (EI) to 0.13ppm daily (PPS)

Everyone says to wait 2-3 weeks to see the results of changes. By week three I was loosing my patience and by week six, they were lost  I don't think the kits are faulty since they are fairly new Lamotte kits and a new pH probe that successfully calibrates. It's not the controller since it is still working properly. Since going back to EI the plants are recovered or recovering and the algae is almost gone. Green spot was gone a week or so after adding 2ppm of PO4 to the tank.

Substrate is the only issue I can say I'm not sure about. The Eco could be leaking but it is nearly 2 years old now. I also vac'ed it good and wish I wold've waited to do that now. I'm just curious as to why the PPS system did not work for me and the EI worked well before and is workind well again. I still only do a water change every 3-4 weeks.

Could I have possibly had too much DON in the tank from not doing regular water changes and dropping my KNO3 dosing? Could that have gave me false high NO3 readings? Substrate and DON are the only factors I can come up with for the problems...


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## fishyface (Feb 7, 2005)

PPS is working magic in my tank where EI seemed to fail me. over the course of 8 months i "guessed and tested" and did not address certain macros. ie Ca and Mg...anyhow i got frustrated ](*,) and decided to try PPS. what can i say but my tank has never been better or more stable. part of the biggest frustration for myself is that EI seemed to work for everyone else cept me!! it all made perfectly logical sense but so does PPS. in the end i believe they both have great merrits and everyone must find what works for them...and i'm just happier than a pig in **** that my plants are growing again!


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## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

fishyface said:


> PPS is working magic in my tank where EI seemed to fail me. over the course of 8 months i "guessed and tested" and did not address certain macros. ie Ca and Mg...anyhow i got frustrated ](*,) and decided to try PPS. what can i say but my tank has never been better or more stable. part of the biggest frustration for myself is that EI seemed to work for everyone else cept me!! it all made perfectly logical sense but so does PPS. in the end i believe they both have great merrits and everyone must find what works for them...and i'm just happier than a pig in **** that my plants are growing again!


You know my frustration then  I had just the opposite experience with PPS! EI worked great for over a year then I made the switch to PPS and things went downhill very fast. My tap water has good amounts of Mg and Ca so that wasn't an issue in my case.

In the beginning of my PPS routine, my Mg was low since I had been using RO water and adding RO Right to it instead of Equilibrium. I either did not add enough of the RO Right or went too long between water changes and depleted the Mg. That is something I did learn from PPS.

Both routines make sense but I was "lured" in to PPS by the lack of water changes. I find it easy to extend the water changes using EI also. It is quite easy to tell when your tank loses that "sparkle" that a well maintained tank has. When it does, it's time for a WC. I have seen it suggested that folks use an inert substrate for PPS. It seems that substrates may leak nutrients back into the water column when WC's are not done. That can be an added expense for someone to replace their substrate to continue using PPS for the merits of not doing water changes.

Let's see, I spent $25 on a Lamotte Ca test kit that I rarely use now, $15 or so on some bottles to store my 4 solutions, $25 on a scale to measure my dry ferts accurately, $100+ on a pH, TDS,EC, Temp meter (the meter comes in handy now too so that isn't much of an issue) and a lot of time (the most expensive item of all since I can never get that time back) measuring my fert levels to have less then good results. EI didn't cost me anything other than water for the water changes which I had to do with PPS since my TDS was rising, possibly due to my substrate. My money expenditure for PPS would have really gone through the roof if I had replaced my substrate also!

Each method has their good points but in my opinion EI is far easier to do and gave me greater results within my first week of using it. And the results continue without me having to fiddle with changing the amounts of solutiions I add every week. EI becomes a routine and does not require much thinking to dose or much equipment to test.

I am truly beginning to think that DON may have been a factor in my less the acceptable plant growth but am not sure.


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

Matt I would not give up on PPS so fast.

When suggesting a method, you need to work on the premise, it has worked for Edward and other folks to a high level(according to them).

I have no reason to assume they are lying about that and neither does anyone.

The method should work if applied, we have done it a long time ago and yes, it does work as he and others say...............

I do not dispute that fact.

What we(numerous local folks) found nearlty a decade ago and people with a very critical eye, that water changes definitely helped improve the the health of the plants vs not doing any water changes at all.

But for many, this trade off for few if any water changes is enough.

Apparently it is not a good trade off for Amano either, who does large weekly water changes also.

But, I think everyone needs to give the PPS method a try, then they can gauge forthemselves.

Personal habits play a huge role in which method you seek.
They all work and all have trade offs.

But careful not to dimiss something, I've done the method, not his per se exactly, but something very similar a long time ago. 

Try the method a few times and keep on top of it. Don't give up after one failure, ask your self "why is someone' else's tank looking better than mine?"

Now apply that to EI also and to the tank pictures on the web, look at Amano's tanks and plant health etc.

Now you have a good max growth/max health/max pearling standard to judge the plant by.

Algae is very often CO2 related. Always keep that issue under control.

I've done eI 2-4 weeks without water changes.

I also have given a method to lower each nutrient down one at a time while maintaining excess levels to find the minmum levels needed for that particular individual tank, then bumping up a tad higher than that.

After a few weeks/months, you'll know the tank's min amounts for many nutrients without testing.

From this "West Coast Lean" approach, you can avoid water changes, test kits and extend out the EI dosing much longer. 

Dave has done this for a few years, but he's also killed fish with CO2

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

MatPat said:


> Could I have possibly had too much DON in the tank from not doing regular water changes and dropping my KNO3 dosing? Could that have gave me false high NO3 readings? Substrate and DON are the only factors I can come up with for the problems...


Do you have a lot of driftwood? Fish load?

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

fishyface said:


> PPS is working magic in my tank where EI seemed to fail me. over the course of 8 months i "guessed and tested" and did not address certain macros. ie Ca and Mg...anyhow i got frustrated ](*,) and decided to try PPS. what can i say but my tank has never been better or more stable. part of the biggest frustration for myself is that EI seemed to work for everyone else cept me!! it all made perfectly logical sense but so does PPS. in the end i believe they both have great merrits and everyone must find what works for them...and i'm just happier than a pig in **** that my plants are growing again!


I think you have it. Habits, more than anything else tends to play a role.
As you gain more experience in the hobby, you can return to various methods that once eluded you.

Main thing is to do a habit routine that works for you and that you can live with. You can also assume that if you have little plant biomass at the start, then some patience will go a long way with either method.

CO2 and getting that correct is the biggest challenge.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

I discontinued PPS back in June I think. I wouldn't have minded the algae if this wasn't my main tank. It is in the living room and it's one of the first things folks see when they come into the house! It was hard for me to have a tank in poor health in that situation.

I will more than likely give it a try again with the next tank I set up, though I plan to use an inert substrate for this next tank. Although it may sound like I have discounted PPS by my rather lengthy, sometimes terse reply, I have not. I've alread spent the money on the supplies for it and plan on trying it again with my next tank. 

I've been the 4 week time frame without a water change using a modified EI...~1.5-2ppm of KNO3 per day and ~0.5pm PO4 every other day. cS gave me the idea when she stated she only added 2ppm per day of KNO3 or something on that line. I add more traces than PPS suggests but can keep the TDS to a 100ppm rise over 4 weeks. The tank does tend to pearl less by the 4th week though. 

I did have a half a dozen small/medium pieces of driftwood in the tank but the fish load was light, 9 Apisto borelli, 2 dozen R. heteromorpha, and 8 Otos with a single daily feeding. Hmmm, I had quite a few Cherry Red Shrimp back then too. 

I was actually hoping both you and Edward would lend a hand and help me figure out why the tank reacted the way it did! It just didn't make sense to me. The dosing routine didn't change that much and according to my KH and pH results my CO2 was way high. It just seems that something was amiss and that is why I started thinking about the DON/DIN part of the equation. I have been over this time and time again trying to figure out why it didn't work! I keep drawing a blank!


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

One thing I think folks need to consider is trying all the methods and then seeing if they can achieve the same levels that other report with the method.
Then you can see the work involved and the trade offs.

I often suggest folks try non CO2 methods, the argument for them is quite strong if not the strongest.

Marine planted tanks are rough, makes any FW plant tank look easy, but things are improving there.

As you extend out the water change frequency, folks tend to have different issues with some plant species while others do not.

The large water change is always the re set.

Many have said allelopathy but I've argued fairly successfully against that "unknown" many times and I also do not have issues with many of the same plants in non CO2 tanks that never get water changes.

There are a few things you can do to extend out the water change frequency with higher light/CO2 plant tanks, activated carbon/purigen etc can be used to clean the organic fraction out.
This will also remove the allelopathic chemicals(often used in the control for studies on allelopathy)

With many tanks, folks have wood which colors the water, PPS and no water changes will cause a very yellow effect which many may not like. 
Same for non CO2 tanks with wood. Carbon can help remove this without a water change. 

But given enough time, the bacteria should break down all the organic fractions and remineralize things for the plants. This occurs nicely in non CO2 planted tanks.

The key is a loading rate and the time.
As we increase growth rates, we also place more pressure on the bacteria decomposers.

This might be part of it.

PPS does not test for everything and tank to tank differences can cause some issues, but mainly personal habits IME.

One way to remove those other confounding factors is to add something like carbon which will not alter the tank with a water change.

You see, this is how you answer some of these seemingly unanswerable questions about a method.

Then you can gauge what is really causing the issues here and not guess.
Edward did a lot of work making a nice series of solutions up, tables for dosing, calibrating test kits and trying to make it simple etc. I disagree with some of things he's said, the history about RL&P's etc and things about EI(but we are not that far off), but the point of the matter is that PPS did and has worked in the past and right now.

Many of those using it have had some trouble with CO2, which is not attributable to the PPS dosing. I can look and see in a few seconds and know.
That has nothing to do with telling me their measurement readings.

Some plants like P stellatus are squirrley, they seem to like the higher NO3 that rich EI affords. PPS lean will not do so well with those so you might consider adding more PPS with certain plants.

PPS, like EI can be tweaked when needed.
Some plants will do better if you add more nutrients.

Lean dosing can bring out certain traits that aquarist desire also.
I'd rather use less light, slower growing plants, go non CO2 etc if I want to maintain a lean system though.............it's easier and affords much more robust stability at lower nutrients.

That stability just will not occur as you get closer to the razor's edge on limitation and high light/CO2. 

I do not know how many times even good testing folks have messed up their stands of P stellatus trying this. The best tester and the best observationalist I know had trouble doing that. 

So rather than messing with that, I seek stability over a range.

We really do not know what many of the upper ranges are.
PPS can be done richer than Edward suggests and maintained that way also(you can use the test kits for that).

You might try the activated carbon and also adding more ferts.
That will rule out the organic fractions and also any limitations for some species while still using the PPS method.


Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Edward (May 25, 2004)

MatPat,



MatPat said:


> The major changes in tank dosing from EI to PPS were:
> A decrease in daily NO3 from 1.72ppm (EI) to 1.14 ppm (PPS)
> A decrease in PO4 from 0.5ppm 3x/wk (EI) to 1ppm per week (PPS)
> A decrease in traces from 15ml every other day (EI) to 1ml per day (PPS)
> ...


http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=8931



MatPat said:


> Back when I was using PPS, my 75g was using ~1.6ppm of NO3 per day and ~0.15ppm of PO4 per day. I now dose my tank with about 2ppm of NO3 daily and 0.6ppm of PO4 every other day. I guess that would put me at about 75% uptake on NO3 and 50% uptake on PO4.


http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=10513

It was wrong TE dose, wrong PO4 dosed by enema, leaking substrate without water changes contaminating water, RO with wrong Ca and Mg levels, use of RO Right, Equilibrium, constant changes and instability. No wonder it didn't work.
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=6747

Tom also told you you didn't do it right.
http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=8931

How can you distribute information about PPS when you were never running it?

Edward


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## duckdog (Oct 21, 2005)

Not trying to cause an argument but from some of the posts this is what I would take it as if I was a bit newer of a newb lol. Throw out my test kits and just toss in what ever I like them do water changes weekly. When my plants look like they are missing something take a wild guess and add more. Like I said I am a newb and not trying to stir the pot just saying if a complete newb read the earlier posts and skipped the rest that one be one less hobbyist for sure

Just my .02
Nelson


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## MatPat (Mar 22, 2004)

Edward,

Thank you for the reply!



Edward said:


> How can you distribute information about PPS when you were never running it?


Actually I did run PPS correctly with the information I received from both you and Discus. If you take a look at my spreadsheet in post #11 here: http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?t=6747&page=2
you will see that I used PPS from 5-5-05 through 5-31-05. PPS was continued for about two more weeks before I gave up and went back to EI. I saw no need for posting any more information in my spreadsheet at that time.

It would seem that most of the information in the links you provided were several months after I had quit using PPS. I dont see how most of them are relevant to our discussion other than to try and discredit me 



Edward said:


> It was wrong TE dose, wrong PO4 dosed by enema, leaking substrate without water changes contaminating water, RO with wrong Ca and Mg levels, use of RO Right, Equilibrium, constant changes and instability. No wonder it didn't work.


According to my spreadsheet:

1) I was adding 1ml of Trace daily when following PPS as suggested

2) I was not using Fleet Enema while dosing via PPS! I purchased KH2PO4, a scale and dosing bottles and accurately measured amounts to make your SS, PF, NF and Mg solutions which I used daily unless instructed to skip dosing, like in the case of your recommendation to skip Mg dosing.

3) Leaking substrate may have been an issue but what was I supposed to do, go out and purchase 200lbs of Tahitian Moon Sand at $1 per pound and toss out the $200 worth of substrate already in the tank? Yes I could have used cheaper silica sand but I prefer a dark substrate. Isn't no/reduced water changes supposed to be the big feature with PPS?

4) Contaminated water? RO water was used prior to starting PPS but not afterwards. I asked if I needed to do a water change before starting PPS and received no response. I also asked about adding some Mg to the tank. It took 4 days to recieve a response and by then I had already added 6ppm of Mg to try and get my Ca:Mg ratio to balance. You will notice in my spreadsheet that my Ca level from the RO Right did match my Tap water. Why did no one suggest I do a a water change to reset the tank? I do believe I even asked Discus this in a PM and received no response.

5) I did not use Equilibrium or RO Right while using PPS. I do believe I probably should have used EQ versus RO Right though. IN one of the post yo lined to I did say I needed to do water changes due to the rising TDS but I don't believe I ever did! It is not in the notes of my spreadsheet and I couldnot find it anywhere in my PPS forum.

6) Where are the constant changes coming from? The only changes made during my use of PPS were what was recommended by either you or Discus. Again, RO water and RO Right were used *prior* to starting PPS and contributed to my low Mg levels as I indicated in my initial PPS thread. I did not do any water changes during my short time using PPS. The only "constant changes" and "instability" while dosing PPS was an increase in algae and decrease in plant health.

You have read into my statements posted months after discontinuing PPS and tried to make them look relevant to this discussion. I believe that is where the Fleet Enema dosing came from along with the ROo water assumptions and water changes information. Everything that I did during PPS was documented in the notes section of the spreadsheet.

Tom did say I needed to give it more time and apply it correctly. He also mentioned that algae is most often a cause of low CO2 levels but it was never suggested that I revisit my CO2 or try increasing it a bit more.

Algae can also be caused by bottoming out something correct? Is it possible that I actually bottomed out my inorganic NO3 and started to cause stunting in the P. stellata and melting tops on my Lobelia?

The question I want to answer is why did all of this happen only after I started PPS?

Was it due to the low Mg levels prior to starting?

Would it have happened had I not started PPS?

Was it due to organic forms of NO3/PO4 and not enough inorganic NO3/PO4?

I don't know the answer to these questions and I was hoping to have some light shed on this back in August when we were initially discussing it.

It just seems strange that things started going downhill within 3 or 4 days of starting PPS. That indicates something has bottomed out to me, but my dosing had pretty much remained the same as you pointed out. The exceptions were a large decrease in TE dosing, large increase in TDS, and a small increase in K dosing.

I'm not trying to start an argument and I had thought this thread died several months ago. All I want to do is understand what went wrong so I can prevent it next time I tinker with PPS.

I do have a new tank I just set up and would like to figure this out so your 3 month delay in responding to this post could not be more timely 

On a good note, the Nesea pedicellata has recovered nicely again


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