# How to maintiane



## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

Hello all , 

My name is josefh and i'm new in all this plant keeping .
i have 240L tropheus tank and i recently add a 36 L tank to my work.
the tank is JEBO R338 , i removed his original light and put two day light 16W each.
the tank passed the cycle phase and its running almost 4 moths.
i would like a help from all of you to tell me how to keep a low tech tank with low tank plants.
the bottles i own for now are:

kent pro plant
kent freshwater plant
seachem excel.
kent botanica .

i own some tesk kits

ammonia, nitrit , PH . 

the substrate i have is amano amzonia 1 .

any help will be appriciated.

thanks , 

Josefh.


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## Seattle_Aquarist (Mar 7, 2008)

Hi Josefh,

It sounds like you are ready to start planting. I would start with some stem plants and see how they do. I would also start with about 6 hours of light and gradually increase it over a month or two, that should help minimize algae. Glad you joined us!


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## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

hello , 

thanks for the reply , i'm glad to join to this site.

the lighting is working 8 hours each day , i want to know what type of plants i can put in there and what are the dosing instruction for the week.
is there any thing else i need to add?
i dont use reverse water should i use?


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## Diana K (Dec 20, 2007)

If your tap water is very hard, then you could mix reverse osmosis and tap water to create a softer water. Plants are OK with a very wide range of water hardness. Fish are more particular. Keeping Tropheus, you will want the harder water in this tank, so I would probably not use RO water for these fish. Hard water plants will do well, and many plants that come from soft water will be just fine in the harder water, too. 
If the other tank is for soft water fish, then you could use RO here. 
Really hard to give specific advise without more info. 
To make this decision:
Test the tap water for GH, KH, TDS and pH. Post these results and a list of what fish you are keeping (or want to get) for the other tank. 

Fertilizer: With low light (.5 watt per liter) I would start with half the minimum dose on the label of whichever fertilizers you decide on, and half dose of Excel and see how things go. ADA substrates can be pretty rich already, so you might find that even this small amount of fertilizers are too much at first. 
Check the nitrate (NO3) test to determine how much nitrate you might have to add. I found that some of my low tech tanks need a very low dose of NO3, but in most of them the fish and fish food are enough.

A little research found the ingredients of the items you listed:

Kent Freshwater Plant Supplement:
Contents: Deionized water, iron (chelated with EDTA), salts of potassium, boron, manganese, magnesium, copper, cobalt, zinc, and molybdenum, and inorganic stabilizers. 

Kent Botanica:
There are several of these. Which do you have? What are the ingredients?
Botanica GH Booster? Cannot give advise without knowing what the GH of the water is already and what the target GH is. 
Botanica Micros? The other fertilizers you have also have micros. Do not over dose. 
Botanica Phosphate? A necessary nutrient, but a little bit goes a long way, and in a low tech tank the fish food might have plenty. 

KENT MARINE PRO-PLANT:
provides nitrogen, magnesium and micronutrients for lush freshwater plant growth. Phosphate free.

Well, I am not sure what sort of balance these ferts will provide, does not sound too hopeful. So much overlap you should not use them all. Too much chance of building up toxic levels of something. 

IME aquarium plants seem to need potassium and iron before they need anything else, and Excel (Carbon source) is good at this point, too. The tap water might provide iron, but even if there is iron in the water it may be in a form the plants cannot use. Chelated Iron is good. 

Many hard water plants can get carbon from the carbonate in the water, as long as the KH is over 3 German degrees of hardness. (It probably is much higher in the Tropheus tank)


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## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

Hey diana , 

thanks for the reply .
should i purchase all the test kits you mentioned because i want to work with the EI model so it really needed?

About thre Fertilizers i have , 

i'm going to switch to DIY Fertilizers and will work on the EI model .


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## sukhkawal (Sep 18, 2009)

to determine if you water is hard water, you definetely need a GH & KH test kit (only a few $$). also try to get nitrate, so you can know your overall reading. and it wouldnt hurt to get a water report from your local water supplier.


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## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

some updates:

bought test kits for the GH&KH and for the No3 .
bought test kits API company .
the GH- needed 21 drops untill the liquid came to green.
the KH - need help with it because i used 21 drops and its still yellow .
the No3- shows 80 on the color meter.

what to do?


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## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

Anyone?


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## davemonkey (Mar 29, 2008)

You have moderate to high light (32 watts over 36 litres). Dose according to recommendations on your bottles and start studying the EI if you plan on switching to that.

Water hardness is not so much a concern unless you are trying to grow more difficult plants. Start planting with a wide variety of plants you like and see how they grow. Some will do better than other depending on your water parameters.

Test kits often times give inaccurate readings. Don't rely on them to tell you what's in your water (unless you have good quality kits). Instead, look for signs and symptoms in your plants.

-Dave


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## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

i will take a picture of the tank with the plants i bought.
i bought API test kits - they very good quality as far as i know.

do you suggest to go down with the light? i think my tank is 36 L so 36 w is 1 w for litr no?


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## josefh (Nov 27, 2009)

Hello all ,

its been a while since i was here , sorry for jumping this tree again but i dont see a point opening a new tree on the same subject.

Here it is:

i'm not quite happy with my 30 L tank . 
i want to restart the all thing again:

here is a picture of the current tank.










here are my problems:

1.the tank is hailea F30 tank, the lighting there really sucks and i dont know how to upgrade it.( any suggestions?)
2. the substrat is ELLOS TERA , i have it in my tank for a bout a year or so.... i recently bought JBL AQUABASIS PLUS to put it below the ELLOS substrate.

what should i do?


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