Calculating My Ei

[SuperColey1]

Hello

I am calculating dosages for EI, so that I can start it next week (first 2 weeks will be 1WPG, to practise and also waiting for a bulb for my new light, after will be 2.8WPG)

My Tank water 1 day after water change reads:
Ammonia - 0.25
Nitrate - 20

My tap water reads:
Ammonia .25
Nitrate - 20

I have a very heavy fish load on this tank and therefore although these figures suggest that the plants aren't using any ammonia or Nitrate, they must be or it would've risen. (although there is an internal filter in the tank)

I haven't got a Kh or Gh kit so can't give reading for the above.

Roughly though would I be right in saying there is enough Nitrate and Phosphorous coming from the fish waste and food? and that I should just dose small amounts of Potassium? + trace?

I can get hold of Pot Nit, Potash and Pot Sulphate at work and was thinking of just using a Pot Sulphate mix?

Andy

 

[zig]

Do you mean ammonia or phosphate in the tap and tank readings you give above? you should have 0 readings for ammonia.

 

[SuperColey1]

The reason some tap water has an ammonia reading is because most ceaning plants now use Chloromine rahter than Chlorine.

Chloromine is Chlorine and Ammonia.

They use this because Chlorine dissipates too quickly along the water route to your house whereas Chloromine doesn't dissipate as fast.

Therefore every time you drink direct from the tank, you are drinking a tinky winky amount of ammonia.

Answer to your question, yes I mean Ammonia and not Phosphate, I haven't got a phosphate testing kit.

Andy

 

[Dave Spencer]

When you start EI dosing you will need to test for nitrates and phosphates for a while to find out what is happening and allow you to settle in to a routine. After this period you will find yourself rarely testing.

With a large fish load and 20ppm nitrate in your tap water, you may find you rarely need to add N or P. To get the K in to the tank, you will need to dose Potassium Sulphate.

Do get a kit to test your phosphates. Most are not too accurate, but at least you will be able to see a trend of what is happening.

Cheers, Dave.

 

[zig]

I understood products like Stresscoat neutralised chloramines from tapwater, do you use this product or any other water conditioner?

Do you know the actual levels of ammonia in the tapwater, have you ever gotten a water report from your water company?

Regardless, you must remove it from the water, even low levels of ammonia are toxic to fish and will also cause you lots of problems with algae more than likely. Ammonia is a common trigger of algae in planted tanks, this along with a high fish load is likely to cause you lots of problems.

I would get a phosphate testkit as Dave has mentioned, you need to have some sort of idea of the levels before you start dosing/not dosing, I usually have my phosphate levels around 2ppm and nitrate around 15-20ppm throughout the week, but I top it up to keep it at these levels, you would need to monitor this when you start off also consider how consistant are the tapwater levels of no3, is it always around 20ppm? If your not dosing this is an important consideration.

 

[SuperColey1]

Cheers Dave I will get a phosphate kit.

I don't use the water conditioners as of last week. Why you may ask? The 'bind' metals and therefore render ferts useless!!! as the ferts are made of many trace metals. Comment and correction welcome on this issue.

I was under the impression that Ammonia got used by plants before Nitrates, as they turn the Nitrates back to Ammonia to use it? sure i read this somewhere.

Also I am assuming that if I put tap water ammonia in, and then add the fish's ammonia, take away what the plant usage, and then the filter's usage, it would be zero? Rubbish API test kit, and I am just going by the colour card against the tube.lol

Comments, corrections, adviceetc. definately welcome. Not being cocky with statements in this thread. It is all info gained from several planted sources, and there are a lot of conflicting views out there.

Andy

 

[zig]

You must always dechlorinate/dechloramine the water before adding it to the tank using a suitable water conditioner, the idea behind water company's using chloramine in the first place is to kill potentially harmful bacteria from our drinking water, without neutralising the chloramine in the water before you add it to the tank it will have exactly the same affect on the bacteria in your filter ie. it will kill it and render your biological filtration ineffective/useless, and then the ammonia will start to kill your fish.

The addition of stresscoat will not render your ferts useless I don't know where you heard this, but this is not the case, it is not true to say this. Ammonia will get used by your plants this is true, but only in levels that your biological filtration can deal with, if you keep rendering it useless by adding unchlorinated water you will have constant problems with algae and probably you will kill the fish as well. Unlike chlorine which can eventually evaporate off water chloramine does not do this, you must remove it first of all by neutralising it because it will remain permanently in the water otherwise.

 

[SuperColey1]

Point taken. and good point too. I read it on one of the Sear articles. Not to not use dechlorinator, but the 'binding' of metals bit, and thought that's no good, I want the metal to stay in the water.

Will use my dechlor again next time. Maybe try to find one that only deals with Chlorine and Chloramine.

There is ammonia in my tap water though!!! I suppose the chloramine part of the dechlor will remove this???

 

[JamesC]

Dechlor won't render the ferts useless as the metal trace's are chelated and can't get to them anyway. That article you read is well misleading.

As you've found out tap water can contain ammonia if you local water board uses choromines so you'll need to use a dechlor that neutralizes both ammonia and chlorine. Be a bit wary as some manufacturers claim that there product neutralizes chloramine when in fact it doesn't really. It breaks the chlorine-ammonia bond and then neutralizes the chlorine leaving the ammonia free to be dealt with by the biological filter.

James