Adding dirt/soil to the established tank!

[BettaBettas]

adding soil to established tank
So now that i'm realizing that my substrate is a bit lacking, ecocomplete and small gravel mix, i've been adding seachem root toabs to the plants that need them. I was thinking about adding some soil at least around where those plants are to get them a bit more minerals and what not. The idea of making some mud ice cubes and shoving them down into the stubrate sounds like the way to go. I was just going to buy a bag of potting soil, any type you all would recommend, i assume stay away fromthe stuff that has the little styrofoam balls in it. Thanks
^ monty on tpt ^
Read this amazing "article" on TPT! http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/29-substrate/122098-adding-soil-established-tank.html
basically to sum it up, is you take an ice cube tray (this is an experiment im going to try, that many others have with failure and success) fill it with dirt mixed with water. preferably topsoil or any trusted, natural soil. freeze it in your freezer and place the cubes quickly, but gently, into your aquariums substrate. Well, in the desired area.
Now the method I came up with of this, that im going to do tomorrow is:
Fill the ice cube trays half way with water/dirt mix, so its slightly easier to put the dirt into the substrate, since usually ice cubes are large cubes or rectangles, and other shapes. this will make mine a cube cut in half, like a mini slab that I can gently push under the substrate to reach the desired area.
Again give Monty on tpt all the credit for this as he brought this idea to us! and remember this has mixed results, good and bad, so I guess ill be the judge for the true answer!
Will update tmrw on how it all goes!

 

[AbbeysDad]

I've been an organic vegetable gardener for over 30 years so I appreciate the value of organically enriched soil. However, even 1" of washed out soil under a sand/gravel cap in an aquarium makes little sense to me. It's value is extremely short lived and it presents numerous negative issues. I feel you might better continue with quality root tabs and up your fert dose slightly.

 

[NickAu]

this makes a good read
http://www.theaquariumwiki.com/Walstad_method

 

[BettaBettas]

I've been an organic vegetable gardener for over 30 years so I appreciate the value of organically enriched soil. However, even 1" of washed out soil under a sand/gravel cap in an aquarium makes little sense to me. It's value is extremely short lived and it presents numerous negative issues. I feel you might better continue with quality root tabs and up your fert dose slightly.

im not doing this because I have a deficiency or anything, im doing it cause I can. its just an experiment

 

[cooledwhip]

I have dirted many tanks, I have said that many times haha. I am the dirt master... Lol. I gotta finish my dirt guide. I just don't have time to go to my LFS and buy some rocks to complete the hard scape.

Anyway. Yes that would work.. It would be better obviously to just tear it down and put an actual dirt substrate in. Make sure when doing that though you SIFT THE DIRT!! If you don't sift your dirt you will have a mess... Big chunks of woodchips will poke through after the ice melts and create an opening, which will allow the dirt to float up and ruin your tank.. SIFT YOUR DIRT.

Don't make the ice cubes too big. It's better to have smaller ones. I did a similar method to you but instead of freezing them I made them into little gel capsules.

Use Miracle Gro Organic soil. It's in a brown/orange bag. It's in my dirt guide.

Good luck!

 

[BettaBettas]

ok so today I tried the project as I said, you can read the steps I was doing in the first post.
So when I added the frozen (perfect soil!) soil into the tank, I immediately saw why people didn't like it... I didn't expect it to be perfect and super easy but, yea. anyway so when I put the frozen soil into the tank, I gently sat in on the substrate, while I was laying it down on the substrate it created a large cloud of muddy colored water, I expected it though, (later on filter cleaned this all up) so I tried shoving it into the substrate but it just fell apart! I gave up on putting it inside the substrate (sand) so what I did was I sprinkled the soil all around the substrate, and the plants. mostly where the plants where. only because I couldn't get it into the substrate, so I can see why people don't like this idea. cool experiment though at least I can say I have some dirt in my tank lol
But as coolwhip said (thanks for commenting), I do think you would be WAY better off just starting over with a dirted tank, like taking everything out, dirting it, then starting over. just easier! IMO
thanks for reading!

 

[StevenF]

Sachem does make good product but I have never used there root tabs. However I compared the untruent levels of the tabs with that of Flourish comprehensive. Magnesium and cobalt are not as abundant as they are in comprehensive. You might want to try Sachem Flourish comprehensive in addition to to the root tabs.

 

[cooledwhip]

Sprinkling it around the substrate or over it won't do anything except create ammonia which will kill your fish. You needed to do a 50/50 mix of water/soil. You really want MUD, becasue the water will melt eventgually but the dirt will stay under the substrate. I would try it again with 5050 water/sprinkled soil.