Re: Low Iron Levels

To: Aquatic-Plants at actwin_com
Subject: Re: Low Iron Levels
From: Stephen.Pushak at saudan_HAC.COM
Date: Tue, 10 Oct 95 18:01:33 PDT
In-Reply-To: <199510101939.PAA03000 at looney_actwin.com>; from "Aquatic-Plants-Owner at actwin_com" at Oct 10, 95 3:39 pm
Mailer: Elm [revision: 70.85]

> Subject: Tank Photos

This really appeals to me. The but is, I live behind a firewall.
We have no FTP or www access. That alone should motivate me to
get a home internet subscription but I already spend lots of time
here. Maybe somebody will mail me some. It sure would make nice
wall paper for my unix desktop. Anybody have a screen saver that
would work with digitized aquarium pictures either for Intel 
PCs or HP-UX? Wouldn't it be neat if we could have an animated
digitized picture?

> From: Cathy Drzyzgula <cathyd at clark_net>
> Subject: Re: Low Iron Levels
> 
> This does not explain all of your situation, but I thought I would mention
> that when I first started adding Dupla drops to my 29 gal. moderately
> planted tank I had to add 10 drops a day (10-20 times normal dose) for 8
> days before I got any Fe reading on the (admittedly lousy) Dupla iron test.
> At the time I thought it might be that the peat in my filter was
> hiding/absorbing it, but I do not notice lower levels when I change the peat
> since then.  It seems to me when plants need iron they can really soak it
> up.  Perhaps with your exuberant water changes your plants just haven't
> finished stockpiling?

I was wondering if high levels of phosphate would cause the iron to
precipitate or be used up more quickly until the phosphate concentration
got lower? This also might account for initial high (apparent) consumption.
When we are measuring Fe concentration, are we measuring total Fe including
chelated Fe or only free Fe ions?

Steve