what are Macro and Micro nutrients

[oscar-lover]

Hey guys, can someone please tell me what are Macro and Micro nutrient dosing for planted tanks...what do these comprise of and where do i buy them...?????

[jax]

Macros are Nitrogen, Potassium and Phosphorus
Micros like Flourish contain iron and many other smaller trace elements.

If you are using co2 you need to dose all of these in your tank. If you are doing low tech than usually your substrate will do the trick (planted substrate).

jax added 1 Minutes and 9 Seconds later...

You can buy all in liquid form if you have a small tank. (seachem) Or you can get them in a powdered version if you are doing a large co2 planted tank.

[oscar-lover]

Thanks Jax

Can all the Macros be mixed together to make a one solution ???? Just curious if it can achieved...What would be the dosage level of each Macros and Micro elements per gallon...and at what intervals....


One more question :)

I was reading your other post on " Plants for sale" and you mention you use Eco Complete, i looked up on google and it says this substrate has all the necessary nutrients for the plants to grow, i am assuming you use Co2 but do you still dose your tanks with all these other ferts... how long does the Eco Substrate last before you have to change it ????...

[jax]

As for the substrate I wont change it. I use a dosing regimine with my high tech tank where I dose powder form of Macros on M W F and use flourish on opposite days. This is if you are using co2 with high lights only. I also change 50% of the water on sunday's.

With plants you can go two routes: Low tech, High tech

Low tech is easier maintance wise but you might be limited to what you can grow. High tech is alot of work but you can grow a variety of plants.

I have 6 low tech tanks and 1 high tech tank. The high tech tank is a ton of work and the maintance on the other tanks combined are about as much time as I spend on the high tech tank.

Hope this helps. Feel free to pm me with any ?'s
JAX

[Typical Tony]

here is some good reading...

http://aquaria.net/articles/plants/barr-dose/

Tom Barr's Method Of Open Loop Aquarium Plant Fertilization
"Estimative Index"

In the late 1980's aquarium plant fertilization was in its infancy and there was scant information outside the Dupla book. Within years it seemed everybody had a plethora of test kits and "ppm" was the buzzword in aqutic plant fora all over the interent. But, Tom Barr makes a good point that you don't need the feedback from the (almost universally) inaccurate hobby test kits, you can simply change water and dose ad infinitum. Here is Tom's method, often called the "Barr method" (postscript a year later, I gues Tom is shy he refers to this as "estimative index" the term "Barr Method" didn't last), an answer to a question whether or not ones needs to be a chemist to dose aquarium plant fertilizers properly. I quote Tom directly: Actually no, it's rather easy to determine the nutrient levels and maintain them in one simple step.
No chemistry lesson is needed at all; you can make cereal right? Add enough cereal to fill the bowl, add 2 cups of milk, 2 teaspoons of sugar.
Or I can say add 250 grams of endospermous carbohydrates and 9.5 grams of sucrose to 450mls of bovine lactate exudate.
In a nutshell, you do large weekly water changes (say 50%) each week to prevent anything from building up and and dose 2-4x a week to prevent anything from running out. The names can be whatever you want them to be, but ultimately all you are doing is adding Nitrate, PO4 , K+ (the NPK numbers of bags of fertilizer) and traces.
Farmers do this without chemistry lessons every day.
In this manner you provide a stable range of all the nutrients cheaply, easily and without using a test kit except for CO2(KH/pH).
An example routine for a 20 gal tank with high light:
50% water change
Add: 1/4 teaspoon of KNO3 1/16 or a smidge of KH2PO4 If GH is lower than 3-5 out of the tap, Add SeaChem Equlibrium(1/4 teaspoon)
Next day add 5 ml of trace
Wait one day, add the KNO3/KH2PO4 again, next day add the trace again
Add the KNO3/KH2PO4 Trace again the next day
Water change: repeat ad nauseum.
Dosing 1/4 teaspoon of powered KNO3 = 1.67 grams according to a lab scale with 10 levels averages.
This added to 20 gal= 10-11ppm of NO3. Error is about 1ppm of NO3.
Name one hobby kit that can be that accurate. I'm not aware of any.
We dose excess nutrients in all cases, and there is nothing wrong with that as long as we don't get too far off base; the water changes prevent folks from lousing it up.
You can guessimate and use the plants as the indicator as you become more skilled and dose less or go longer without water changes. But again, no test kits are needed.
As long as you keep up on dosing and water changes, this is a very simple method and no hassle if you put an automatic water changer on your tank, python style water changer etc or hard plumb a drain/refill.
KH2PO4, KNO3 are very cheap, SeaChem Eq is relatively cheap as well for the once a week dosing. Traces are not too bad at this amount.




get to know this site as well, from the same guy.

http://www.barrreport.com/

[oscar-lover]

Wonderful read Tony, thanks a lot....all of this dosing of Macro and Micros is making sense to me now....thanks again....:salut:

@ Jax, thanks to you too and you should expect PMs from me :D

[AndrewH]

You putting together a planted tank?

[oscar-lover]

Well, have been doing some reading and growing out few low light plants...and they have done well in my tanks so that has got me inspired...so yes, i am working on starting a planted tank...