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Nutrients on ze way!
I probably could get the stuff localy, at a decent lfs, but at a convienent LFS? unfortunatly no.

Shipping Method: UPS Ground
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Product ID: Nitrate
Product Name: Potassium Nitrate 1 lb.
Quantity: 1
Unit Price: $2.17
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Product ID: PotassiumSulfate
Product Name: Potassium Sulfate 1 lb.
Quantity: 1
Unit Price: $2.17
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Product ID: PotassiumPhosphate
Product Name: Mono Potassium Phosphate 1 lb.
Quantity: 1
Unit Price: $3.42
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Product ID: Flourish
Product Name: Flourish
Quantity: 1
Unit Price: $7.95

It's debatable whether you need to dose so4 separately becuase the amount you get in the no3 is pretty much inline with EI standards.

Ive got to say, this expirence being what it is, Im going to spend the 3 dollars and have the sulfate.

--- On a side note I wonder how much KNO3 you can buy before they are required to report you to the FBI. They do that will all sorts of thing in chem labs and I assume they do it with this.

-- On the main point is ther eanything else I should remember to do with the black out?

Chaos

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Wow, I followed that link and the prices are great! I may be ordering myself soon!

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

On a side note I wonder how much KNO3 you can buy before they are required to report you to the FBI.

Don't worry, they made an entry about you as soon as they saw your latest full tank pictures .

Anyway, KNO3 in itself does not contain enough K to balance the N, it is the combination of KNO3 with Potassium Phosphate that creates the balance (and I think there is quite a bit in Flourish as well). So if you dose a lot of Potassium Phosphate (what is your tab P? ) then you will for sure not need the Potassium Sulfate. But I am with you, these $3 will not kill you .

I am no expert on black-outs at all, never done one, so no useful info from me.

Ingo

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Chaos,

Just to make sure that I am on the right track, or to make sure that I am way off (either way, I would like to know):

I just saw your entry in the algae outbreak thread in the general forum. As tetratech said, you are a good sport .

But you made a comment there, and earlier you made a similar one here to, that makes me believe you misinterpret one of your algaes (or I am wrong, possible to). All the brown slime are diatoms, this is not Staghorn algae. I just want to make sure. I know the Dr. said something that can be interpreted as identifying the slime as Staghorn, but if this is really what he meant then I believe he is wrong. Your brown slime is based on silica and as long as you are getting more and more of it there must be some food source for it.

Here is a close-up of your own Staghorn, just to show the difference:

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Staghorn Algae

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Anyway, KNO3 in itself does not contain enough K to balance the N, it is the combination of KNO3 with Potassium Phosphate that creates the balance (and I think there is quite a bit in Flourish as well).

OH LF your so precise or is it retentive. Most of the K is coming from the n03. You will had a "smidgen" more from the P and maybe the Flourish. In fact the K in the no3 alone brings the K to N ppm levels to a 4 to 6 ratio, which is pretty much inline with EI guidelines, plus of course what you get from the tap, flourish and P.
Remember your only dosing like 1 to 10, 1 to 8 P to N, so you can't be getting that much from that "smidgen"

My Scapes

OH LF your so precise or is it retentive

Didn't your forget the a*** word before retentive?

I guess I am a little of both , but seriously - I think part of it is the second language thing, it makes me tend to take words too literally. This has good and bad sides and most people, like my wife, have learned to live with a guy who does absolutely nothing if the request/question/anything is phrased loosely.



Ingo

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Hey,

I am clear what is the algae and what is the diatoms now. Though, what you circled on the top of the anubias is roots from the anubias, the bottom circle is algae.

Anyway I know what is what know. I looked em all up again, problem was no pictures of diatoms and the stagorn I found was little ammounts which didnt resemble mine.

Chaos

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I think I linked this before. This is a thread on APC showing excel treatment on staghorn with some very nice photos.

http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/showthread.php?p=94640#post94640

My Scapes

Chaos,

Below is a link for a guide to starting up an aquarium that I've been looking over. The first pic on this page shows how bad what appears to be diatomic algae can get. It's an interesting guide, full of some what appear to be good tips.

http://www.vectrapoint.com/main/manual/bms9.html

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Back in the saddle!

I need to be a bit more awake when I write things What Ingo circled in the photo is indeed what I meant with Staghorn algae. Chaos, both circles are staghorn, neither are roots, I can see only one root in the upper circle.

Dr. Yeah, i see now that that is also staghorn, the pictures in tetra's link were helpfull with that, because it looks so much different from the other aglae in my tank.

Nowhere. Thats a very helpfull link. While I am now 4 or 5 weeks into my tank, I am at about the week 2 stage in that article. So I am doing the blackout and then begin nutrients. If only I had an army of shrimps.....

Thanks guys, particulaly the algae ridden 'nature aquarium' tank makes me feel better. And I think I am back on track, which is good.

Chaos

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I still would consider breaking it down and starting over. If you're not up for it that's understandable, but it's something that can be done on a Saturday when you have a few hours of free time. You only need a bucket holding container for the fish and a little cheap filter to run while they're in there. Just pull it all up, rinse it out, bleach what needs to be bleached, rinse, dechlor, replant and you'll be good as new. It'll only take a few hours and you can rest assured you're making a complete clean start. No decaying ammonia producing dead algae every which place to worry about (oh yes, there will be lots after a blackout)

This time you can start over with lots of hungry stem plants in the back and floating. I think that website does a pretty decent job at showing how to set up a new tank. (except for that part about the shrimp - sure, put 200 ammano shrimp in the tank, then when you're done, put them in your special shrimp tank for later! yeah, right... )

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Back in the saddle!

Hello all!

The bleach / scrub down went well. All the algae I could reasonably remove is gone. The rocks are super clean again and the anubias got the right amount of exposure to bleach. (my bottle of bleach said extra strong and I killed the arachnis testing my concentrations)

I will get more of the arachnis or some wisteria to get the plant mass up significantly.

Nowhere- Im going to try to avoid needing a total restart. I will make sure to keep up with the decaying material via water change, it would be bad to have a big NH4 spike at this point.

Chaos

Edit: Oh, I got a chance while bleaching to see my anubias really closely which was nice. There were mabey 8 new leaves between the five plants and some new growth at the end of the risomes which makes me optamistic about their growth in the right conditions. I noticed a few holes in one of the leaves (this is my low K indicator bensaf?). well all should be well in the near future.


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Well done, Chaos. Get a lot of cheap, fast-growing, nutrient-sucking plants like anacharis, hornwort, watersprite, hygrophila polysperma, wisteria, and you're good to go. With that size tank, you will probably only need to get a bunch or two of each. Get comfortable with the proper dosing routine for the tank with those plants (they're also good indicators if you're lacking one nutrient or another) and then slowly replace them with the plants you really want.

Anyways, looking forward to a G-rated picture of your tank in the near future.

P.S. Holes in anubias is most probably potassium deficiency as you said.

-P

looking forward to a G-rated picture of your tank in the near future

I'll second that

Glad to hear it went well. Get the plants, let them settle in for a week, then start your dosing. Remember, you're going to get diatoms again, but this time try to stay on top of them. You can scrub them off and pick the stuff out if you can, stay on top of it and don't let it get settled in. For the time being stay on top of ammonia levels, this is bad not only for the fish but can cause algae issues as well. WCs if necessary. Keep us posted

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Back in the saddle!

G-rated ( g for green? ) pictures you say? I suppose I can help.

Things are doing well for the blackout. Mabey the algae is ok more than I would like but the HC will live which is a priority too.

Interstingly, one of my lemons is much healthier than ever before. It is very very yellow that is.

My lemons tasted their first bloodworms under my care and they liked them (who is supprised?) Hopefully they will all color up well in the near future to super bright like the other. I didnt have the lights on long enough to really try to photograph the fish, but ill get pics of it on sunday.

As you can see the HC is looking healthier, though BGA on this piece.

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Anacharis reins supreem!!

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Good news everyone!

Time to actually figure out the ammounts involved in my new ferts regimine. Ill probably also try to find MSDSs on these. I am particularly intersted in weather or not any of these absorb water out of the air, which could cause the crystals to cake together or degrade in some way.

Can someone guide me to a site that has how much fert in spoonfuls per gallon to get a specific ppm value?

Mabey that was clear, thanks,

Chaos

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Chaos,

http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/fertilator.php



My Scapes

Or if you want to put your chemistry knowledge to good use:
http://users.ev1.net/~spituch/Chemicals/chemicals.html

-P

Hey all,

Im thinking through what I want to do for dosing. I will probably go with standard solutions that allow me to dose the same volume of liquid from each. That will take some math but will make life easier for me.

More importantly, I am thinking about adding a 'ground crew.' I can easily keep up with algae on glass and stones but not as easily with the fluffy stuff on algae. Nutrients should slow down the growth, but some of it is still around (I doubt its all dead after the blackout). So I was thinking about getting some ghost shrimps. My lfs has some as feeders (I couldnt find any other species other than bamboo [filter feeders]). The info I oculd find on ghosts said they are good as far as any detritus goes and that they will eat threadlike or fluffy algaes so they may be helpfull. The LFS just relocated and the shrimp tank is a bit cloudy (white cloud not green) and I dont know if that is bad or not so I wont getting any without hearing comment on that point.

Anyway it seems like a good idea to get some maitnence animals and I think the shrimp might be ok. while the aquaruim isnt perfect for shrimp yet, at least I wont feed them to anything so I guess thats ok.

Let me know what you think.

Chaos

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- - - Humorous Bit of Wisdom - - -

If you could find them, the cherry shrimp seem to be the most tolerant of water conditions and eat the largest variety of algae.



My Scapes

My lemons are having an intersting morning. Yesterday when I turned the lights on to feed them I got a little worried because one of my males had a bulge between the pectoral fins. I was worried that it was sick, some kind of infection or something but I am no longer worried.

My female was carying eggs. Apparently my mature lemons are one male and one female. They have been mating for about the last hour. I see mabey 2 surviving eggs. The juveniles are quick at picking up whatever eggs are being spawned, the adults too to some extent. They are still going through the spawing behavior at this point but I think the female is out of eggs ( I dont see her drop any ). I gather this who series of events was brought on by the bloodworms I fed them. I didnt think that was possible but now that I found [link = This paper]http://www.ctsa.org/upload/publication/CTSA_142631672855600603648.pdf[/link] it seems clear that one good protein meal might be all that is necesary as it says females can spawn every 4 days. It is intersting though that the lemons are not getting along well right now, they are more agressive then I have ever seen them, particulalry the female chases the juvaniles around.

Im going to look through my pictures and see if I have any good ones of the breeding.

As for the 2 eggs, if they are viable I dont have the means to care for them, which is unfortunate, but if this keeps up I would need quite a set up to take care of anywhere near all the fry these two could produce.

As far as the cherry shrimp go, I think they would be a good perminant edition, but I would have to mail order them or pay very high prices, 8$ per at a lfs to special order them.

Also, there was some sort of white worm that went for a quick swim while I was watching the spawning. It was mabey 5mm long an 0.5mm in diamater. it swam in a spiraling motion and settled down into the gravel before one of the fish could eat it. This is the first one of these I have seen and dont know if this is ok or bad.

Ill update ferts and stuff later today when I get a chance to do all the water chemistry tests.

Chaos

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Unfortunatly the lemons move very very quickly with the spaqning so I could not get that good a photograph.



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If there were any eggs that made it this is it.



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Wow Chaos! Congrats!
I noticed my barbs did the same thing after I recently fed them bloodworms, the frozen kind. I didn't get to see any eggs as they 'did it' while we were sleeping. My female barb got all fat, then the boys chased her all over the tank for hours, in the morning she was skinny again and they looked happy and satisfied. She's been holding those eggs for a very long time. All it took was higher temp, the addition of CO2 to lower pH and a good protein feed. I'm not going to try to raise any if they do it again, the rest of the fish can have some good live food for a change.

The tanks looking much better, not as 'horrifying' as it was. Ghost shrimp don't live for very long, just to warn you, they only live a few months then that's it. Mine lasted through 3 moltings. The amano, yamato and cherry's all live longer I think, I'm not sure how much longer, I was discouraged after the ghost gave up the ...ghost! But it would be a great short-term solution for cleaning up the tank. Get as many as it will hold!

"If you're afraid you'll make a mistake, you won't make anything."
-Family Circus

Hey,

Thanks, I actually didnt see her depostit any eggs, but the behavior is unmistakeable. I will get a few of the shrimp tonight, as the water quality looks good as far as NH4 NO2 go.

Chaos

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Hello,

I got me some little friends. I officially have an army of shrimps, a small army, but they eat the fluffy stuff and will help keep things clean. ( I do understand new nutrient schedule will need to be responsible for most of the algae reduciton but these guys can clean out stuff I could never reach.) also, they were almost free which is nice.



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How many ghosts shrimp did you get. Have you observed them eating the algae. I have a few of those along with amanos and cherries. Unfortunately in my tank I almost never see the cherries or the ghosts they are also hiding in the blanket of wisteria I have. The amanos seem to prefer higher ground and move about the dw and plants. The Wisteria is several layers thick, but because of the leaf structure there is enough room for small fish and shrimp to move about freely through the layers and feel protected.



My Scapes

Hey,

I got a few, 12 or so. They are hard to count, and they kept moving in the bag, but that is close.

They do eat the algae which has been so troublesome for me. I have seen them do it. They all started to fill up with green shortly after I released them.

Oh, I can see mine (well they are in the open at least) because there isnt really anywhere to hide in my tank. There is a lot more plant mass than before, but at this point most of them have been hanging out on the HC squares. Because I cant actually watch them I have been enjoying their presence alot allready because they are so active. They dont really butt heads with the lemons, but they will become defensive if one gets to close.

Chaos

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