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Re: poor man's dupla drops



On Friday, 12 January 1996, Cindy wrote:

> I'm very interested in your PMDDs.  I have two questions though.  First of
> all, I have access to all of the ingredients except the chelated trace
> element mix.  Where do you get your's from and what is the name of it?

I buy "Chelated Trace Element Mix" from a local hydroponics shop.  It
contains Fe, Mn, Zn, Cu, B, and Mo.  Any similar mix with 7% Fe should
be fine.  For other Fe concentrations you'll need to adjust the amount of
mix you use.
 
> Secondly, my tank is quite a bit more low-tech than your's and smaller too.
> It is a 10 gal. and has no CO2 injection or laterite.  So, what type of
> dosing regimine would you recommend?

Start with 1ml/day and measure the iron.  You'll probably need much less
than this eventually since you don't have a CO2 source.  I try to keep the
iron at about 0.1ppm.  Check the nitrates too; if your tank has relatively
high nitrate levels you might want to replace the KNO3 with K2SO4.

If you don't want to invest in an iron test kit, add the formula when you
change water.  Use enough to give (say) 0.2ppm Fe in the replacement water.
Each ml of PMDD contains roughly 2mg Fe, so you'd use 1ml PMDD for every
10 liters replacement water.

> Oh, and do you think I should even try this without laterite?

Sure, why not?

If you have enough light, I really think you should rig up a DIY CO2 source
(but be careful; it's easy to crash the pH in a small tank).
--
Kevin Conlin   kcconlin at cae_ca   "We're Canadians.  We HAVE to be polite"
Finger as332 at freenet_carleton.ca for PGP public key.