Best Plant Food?

[Gilli]

Advise please on the best liquid plant food to use and if there is a cheap way of doing it as I have a large 250L tank. For instance I use pond dechlorinator instead of the small bottles the fish shop sell and save a fortune this way is there some kind of pond alternative for plants that can be used more cheaply?

Also how often should they be dosed?

 

[tribalbrit]

Dry ferts are the cheapest option I have a 750lt and treat every day except sunday..

 

[Gilli]

Wow ! you have to dose ferts evey day? I thought it would be something like every couple of weeks! I can see that costing a fortune for a 250L!!

 

[PDSimon]

Dosing everyday is meant to be better for the plants and apparently to help keep algae away.

Dry ferts is probably the best option for big tanks. For smaller tanks TPN+ and easylife range are the most popular.

 

[tribalbrit]

Dry ferts dont cost all that much, and you are only dosing small amounts every day. 1 or 2 teaspoons max. I havent purchased any for a while now so must last a few months..

 

[StandbySetting]

Dry fertilisers are the best method in my opinion, they're cheap, quick to make up and easily available.

You need to get hold of some distilled water, and some dry salts (Potassium Nitrate, Potassium Phoshpate, Magnesium Sulphate and chelated traces) where the salts I used to make up my fertilisers, I mixed all of mine in separate bottles with distilled water.

Generally dosing consists of Macro's and Micro's (Macro's are NPK) Micro's (Traces) and they're dosed on alternate days so Macro one day, Micro the next etc, some people choose not to dose on one day of the week and this is when they do a water change.

Do some research on estimative index and dry fertilisers, because using a liquid fertiliser on a tank of this size is going to cost a lot!

 

[Gilli]

Wow this all sounds a bit too compliated to me! Do they not sell 'ready mixed' ferts i can just add tank water to? Anyone know of any good UK sites where to buy such things please?

 

[StandbySetting]

Take a read of these:

http/www.jsctech.co.uk/theplantedtank/EI.htm

http/www.jsctech.co.uk/theplantedtank/PMDD.htm

http/www.jsctech.co.uk/theplantedtank/allinone.htm

http/www.jsctech.co.uk/theplantedtank/traces.htm

 

[RadaR]

No idea what your tank set up is like therefore we cant really advise you what you should get.
All this talk of daily dosing and such is irrelevant if you have a low tech tank, which the fish can provide enough nutrients. You'd only have to dose trace elements every so often.
Tanks with CO2 need daily dosing of macro and micro nutrients.
Dry salts will work out much cheaper.

 

[RobGoldsmith]

I was wondering what I would would need for mine, but after reading this I am more lost now! Thought there would be a simple does all product but looks very complicated