lmhicks101
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Posts posted by lmhicks101
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@Tihshho So just making sure I’m looking this right. You had 6 10 gallons and 10 large rubber mades with low water in them converting emersed to submersed growth then selling to the LFS and consumers? You kept them in the rock wool and didn’t breed them? What light did you use and what was your over head cost compared to profit?
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On 5/12/2022 at 2:23 PM, JettsPapa said:
Here's my input, and I guarantee it's worth what it costs you.
The plant selection depends on your market. If you're wanting to sell to local stores, find out what they don't already have, and grow that. You can't compete with their normal wholesalers. That's why I sell mostly guppy grass, pearl weed, and subwassertang. The only time I've seen any of those in a store is when either I or the owner grew it, and the owners don't generally want to take the time. If your market is selling directly to consumers then the ones you mentioned are fine.
By the way, there are advantages to both markets. Selling to consumers you can of course get more money per item, but it's also a lot more hassle, and more labor intensive in general. I do some of both, but I prefer wholesale. I'd rather make one $200.00 sale than four $25.00 sales, even if it takes more product to get there.
A 75 gallon tank will probably work okay, but I'd give serious thought to something that isn't as tall but still has a good footprint, like a 40 gallon breeder. You'll be working in this tank a lot. I'd rather be getting wet up to my elbows instead of shoulder. Also, a less intensive light will work since it's closer to the plants.
I wouldn't recommend shrimp in the same tank with your plants if you're going to be dosing with CO2. Shrimp are sensitive to the pH fluctuations you get with that. It can be done, but you have to be careful. You can grow a lot of shrimp in a 10 gallon tank, and there are plenty of plants you can grow in it that do just fine without CO2.
Thank you for that. The guppies we’re going to be feeder guppies since people in this area want to start giving healthy feeders to their fish.
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On 5/12/2022 at 2:37 PM, Tihshho said:
If you want to grow plants and have the space, the best thing to do is build a rack and use cheap tanks, cheap terrariums or large rubber maid bins. Emersed growth is a ton faster to get, and you can convert it in one tank prior to sale. It's cheaper to setup for variety and you don't have to crowd a tank and worry about EI dosing long term. Growing plants paid off when I was able to sell converted plants to the LFS and local hobbyists, even getting more than the LFS paid wholesalers because they didn't get a freight charge for the order. Knowing plants were converted prior to receiving them was a big hit too because they didn't have to deal with conversion woes in their sale tanks.
Thank you for the input. So I bought a small growth of 5 pink flamingos that came in a culture from petco for $15 and grew them out for a little and sold 2 for $15. One died but keeping the others to see if I can grow them out. Is there a specific place you buy yours from and do you have any pics of your set up?
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On 5/11/2022 at 7:31 PM, KBOzzie59 said:
Guppys and shrimp. The shrimp are fantastic for getting the really small stuff and guppy poop.
Guppies for the most part will leave neos alone?
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So I’m considering getting a 75 gallon tank and setting up a small breed for profit for my LFS and some friends. I’m thinking 90% beginner plants like trident or lace java, wendti, swords, Guppy grass, Pogo Octopus, and ludwigia. The other 10% would be rarer stuff like Pink flamingo, Anubis marble, and some Buce Sekadau Giant Blue.
I’m also considering adding in guppies or neo shrimp for bioload and for extra profit so I’ll need to do a couple sponge filters and an air stone as I’ll be doing C02 and 2 bubbles per second. Do you think this will be a nice set up or should I try something else?
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We’ve talked more about it and possibility of just adding some soil or sand to the spots he wants rooted plant but he needs to slowly transition from 88-89° down to 80°, add air stones, and then switch to the sponges. He just put root tabs in the other day.
So yeah gonna have him dump some root tabs in while he slowly lowers the temps of a week or so and adds air.
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On 5/10/2022 at 4:57 PM, Dancing Matt said:
I personally would not change substrate, sand does not work in my experience (well for plants) and gravel should be fine. Does the filter have anything besides sponge or media like a carbon or phosphate pad? If there is a lack of nitrates theoretically he could change less water or less frequently...
He has them mostly filled with media balls and he’s gonna try out a different substrate in another tank and see how it goes. Hth doesn’t compact and is cheap but he may switch over to Stratum if he likes how this goes. He only just started doing plants. Thank you @xXInkedPhoenixX and @Fish Folk he’ll try that and see if lowering temps and possibly switching filters or lowering the media will help.
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Asking for a friend as I have no experience with discus tanks. He has a 75 gallon with discus and he’s dowsing easy green 9 pumps and no nitrates in the water after 24 hours.
Changes water 40% every week.
FX6 filter
marine programable blue and white light
Easy green liquid fert - dosed once a week
Easy Root tabs - 6-8 weeks
Tanks about 5-6 months old.
Full Pea gravel substrate
Feeds them beef heart and flake foods that take over 10 minutes to eat once a day
I already told him he needs to switch over to sand or aqua soil but checking if anyone can recommend something for the lack of nitrates. I’m thinking cut back the filter but want a second opinion before having him rescape and remove some filter media.
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On 5/9/2022 at 5:07 PM, Minanora said:
That's pretty funny.
Your tank is lovely btw!
Thank you. I hope it’ll look as good when im done redoing it. Would you be able to identify this plant? It came in a batch of stems marked ludwigia rotalia and was a stem with roundhouse leaves. It was fine then I trimmed it and all new growth came in like little thin leaves like that. Was it ludwigia? I ended up selling it because it shed like a saint Barnard and got every where.
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On 5/9/2022 at 3:48 PM, Minanora said:
This^
I third the motion and encourage mts.
For a moment I thought you guys were meaning Malaysian trumpet snails lol. Multiple tanks makes more sense.
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I like the fine grain for my loaches to dig in. I went from fluval stratum we’re they couldn’t sift through. It sucked planting in.
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On 5/9/2022 at 1:41 PM, JoeQ said:
In my 36g i have eco complete which sucks to plant but is good on nutrients. My 10g Quarantine tank has seachem sand. Its great for planting plants but a little spendy plus the compaction issue..... I have a 15g waiting to be setup and there I plan to use Black Diamond blasting sand with a plenum which I hear will help that compaction issue.
Try out be HTH filter sand substrate. It’s like $35 for a 50lbs bag at Ace and should be every where now that it’s pool season. Also it doesn’t compact. @Seattle_Aquarist I think suggested it and as you can tell my plants are doing great. He suggested 1 capsule of osmo pearls per 10 gallons every 6 weeks. Another thing I’ve been seeing online is it absorbs nutrients from waist that’s on top of it.
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What’s your substrate? I’m using HTH filter sand. It holds them good except for the digging. I moved them all to the front and trimmed everything down so hopefully that gives the loaches more places to explore and they leave the parva alone. I won’t know until I get back home Friday. I might try the staples if they keep it up.
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On 5/9/2022 at 12:40 PM, JoeQ said:
Nice! Thats one of the things I love about the hobby; getting things to grow that people say need co2..... As for parva, I can't even get mine to root, but on the other hand my s. Repens is growing well, just slowly..
Mine grows but really slow. The problem is for every new shoot I get my Kuhlis uproot 2.
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Yeah I’m gonna keep her like she is. I’m redoing a lot of my plants in my tank and I’ll just work around it. I’ve gotten about 5 or 6 runners I found in the bushes around it.
I put osmo root tabs in every 6 weeks and one goes in like 2 inches from it plus it was really crowded. Fingers crossed I can repeat this with my 2 new pink Flamingos.
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@JoeQ thank you and I’m working on trimming it down. If it doesn’t work to well I’m gonna do what @DaveO suggested. I’ve got 3 or 4 runners around it right now so fingers crossed.
i just discovered the amazingness of selling my extra plants to the LFS. Had 2 pink flamingo runners and a crap ton of duck weed, Java ferns, scarlet temple, and Java moss they bought and gave credit for. Might see if they want this big Red Wenditi for a display tank.
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So I’m guilty of being that crazy cat guy of fish keeping with plants. If I went to my LFS or petco I go right for the plants and buy what ever I’ve never grown and it got to the point my tanks were way over grown. so lately I’ve been trimming back the plants and selling what I don’t need anymore. The problem is one of my first plants (a red Wendtii is now super tall. Any chance of getting it back to the size of my green I got at the same time?
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I have a bit of red plants that are starting to get a little dull. I have Scarlets, pink flamingos, red crypt Wendtii, and red Ludwig. How much should I dose. I’m currently using thrive complete C 1-2 times a week depending on nitrate levels. This is a 29 gallon. I do have a few amonos if that matters. I’ve seen so many mixed opinions online.
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I don’t have any charcoal but I have a bag of seachem purigen. Hopefully that works. I just tossed it in.
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@Griznatch yeah my bladders got wiped out but my ramshorns are carrying on strong like nothing happened.
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So I had assassins before and they all died out. I figured it was from the planaria treatment from a month ago and got it out of the tank.
I just added 5 more and already 3 are tucked in their shell right where I dropped them 3 hours ago. The other 2 one is at the top of the tank and the other is missing. Yes I have Kuhlis but these snails aren’t being eaten. Yes I did drip acclimate them for 45 minutes. I did it for a group of ammo shrimp in a separate bowl with a separate air line hose to each. They’re doing fine. Shrimp are from my LFS and snails are from Petco. They were crawling around at the store and all but one in the bowl.
ammonia - less then .25
ph - 6-6.4
Nitrites - 0
Nitrates - 40-50
Kh - 3
GH - 8
temp - 77°
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It’s something in the water here. No one I know in this area can keep the water 100% clear of ammonia. Mines barely green. I meant to put less then .25. As for the nitrites I did a 50% water change and added some prime. It’s down to less then 40 nitrates now. I’ll get it to between 20-40 and try and keep it steady there for the plants.
Also changed the filter and cleans it out with old tank water and added some KH booster to the tank. I can’t keep my tank above 6.2 ph. It’s all HTH sand.
Small breed for profit experiment for plants question
in Plants, Algae, and Fertilizers
Posted
I appreciate everyone’s input. I think I’m going to go with the cheap rack method a few people recommended. I’ll probably do the basic plants but also try some Val and an rare plant or 2. Before I do anything though I’m gonna keep reading up and watching videos on care and set up so I understand how propagating and the ins and outs of packaging and selling works before I get anything going. Thank you everyone.