Akadama

[JenCliBee]

Hi plants geeks , herd of this stuff and people say they have really good results with it, what you all think?

Also does this stuff actually need capping? or is it a stand alone substrate?... was thinking of mixing a bag or 2 with some gravel... ie mixing together not a layer of gravel on top.

Any help of experience with this stuff is greatly appriciated


jen

 

[aaronnorth]

its good, has a high CEC (cation exchange capacity) so lasts ages and ages. It is a complete substrate. It will have an intial KH & GH drop (oh no i hear you cry lol) but it will settle. This can be avoided by soaking it in calcium & magnesium sulphate so that it becomes "saturated" with these ions, it exchanges magnesium, calcium, etc for hydrogen ions. The exchanged hydrogen ions then react with any bicarbonates in the water causing the KH and pH to drop. Also due to magnesium and calcium being held by the Akadama the GH will drop as well.

http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/akadama.htm

 

[JenCliBee]

its good, has a high CEC (cation exchange capacity) so lasts ages and ages. It is a complete substrate. It will have an intial KH & GH drop (oh no i hear you cry lol) but it will settle. This can be avoided by soaking it in calcium & magnesium sulphate so that it becomes "saturated" with these ions, it exchanges magnesium, calcium, etc for hydrogen ions. The exchanged hydrogen ions then react with any bicarbonates in the water causing the KH and pH to drop. Also due to magnesium and calcium being held by the Akadama the GH will drop as well.

[URL="http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/akadama.htm"]http/www.theplantedtank.co.uk/akadama.htm[/URL]

LOL!!!

Not really to bothered on that account with the drop in KH etc etc, its going to be a heavily planted tank and tbh it will probably not have fish in for several mnths so it will give itself time to settle anyways and then ill consider actually cycling by adding mature media from my other tanks, if i add enough from each it should be instantly cycled to what fish i have planned for it(very low stocked). Cheers for the link m8 gonna go have a good read, looks like i may actually opt for this instead of the ecco-complete i was origianlly going to use


thanks again

jen

 

[JenCliBee]

Just read that article m8 and he seems to think it's really good, think i might give it a try now and see for my self , thanks again for the link... very interesting and the blokes tank looked superb before and after lol

cheers jen