Thornapple61

Yes it does. But the salt is only used when it regens to clean the media in the softener itself. But there’s likely residual salt in the softener after it’s cleaned itself

I’ve had my planted tank “set-up” (long story) for about 4 weeks. I have a well with a water softener, so I recently started dosing equilibrium to try to bring the GH up. Plant growth seems hit or miss depending on species. (Java fern seems a little rough). I am also suspicious that I may not be fertilizing enough, and some other nutrient deficiencies going on Tank is stocked with (15) Neons; (6) orange venz Corys, (5) chili rasboras Turns out I have a spigot in the basement pre-water softener. So I ran a cup of hard and soft water and put a test strip in. Here is what I found soft water: GH=0; KH=40; PH=6.4 hard water: GH=150; KH=120; Ph=6.8-7.2 In terms of plant growth, am I better off converting over to my hard water? Can my livestock handle the transition? I understand the neons probably will disagree with it. If I did change over, would it be wise to do it gradually through water changes? Thanks in advance. ***or a thought I just had…could I mix my hard and soft water and end up with my GH goal..shooting for 3-6 and still possible have the added nutrients from the harder water?

Is a fella supposed to be dosing fertilizer until nitrates are at 20ppm? I’ve seen this 20ppm figure mentioned several times on this forum in my short time here. I’ve recently setup my first planted aquarium (first meaningful aqauarium really) on Jan 1. I have never had much ammonia at all, let alone nitrite/nitrate. I have dosing easy green twice a week and still never had much of anything for nitrate according to the test strips.

Do aquarium plants receive any benifit from blue light? I’ve read that algae really likes it. I am a new tank owner with a pretty fresh tank that I am working on getting balanced. I have some great algae and black algae popping up, but I don’t thinks it’s a problem (yet). But am just wondering if a guy even bothers with having the blue light on.

Thanks guys I appreciate the help!

Hello! New to the hobby. Recently purchased a 65 gal. Tank kit. That I just re-setup this past weekend (first try looked pretty rough). It’s fairly heavily planted and I currently have 15 neons in it. I have very soft water. I recently purchased some Seachem Equilibrium to bring the GH up. My questions are? - I’ve read that 3-6 GH is ideal, or at least a good starting point? -do I dose this gradually? Or add the whole 65 gal dose at once? (Comcernef about shocking the tank) current water parameters per the test strips are (I struggle differentiating the colors on the test strips): -GH: 0-25 PPM -KH: 80-120 -PH: 6.4-6.8 Thanks in advance