Mmiller2001

Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen. I would ban it from my place but that's just my thinking, post cancer.

I encourage everyone to try CO2, but as @Flumpweeselmentions, slow growers remain slow growers even with CO2. You will see a bit faster growth, but it's not a giant difference. That said, CO2 will open up the plant selection you could put in the tank and fast growing plants become turbo charged.

How long ago did you make this change? What percent water changes are you doing and how often? With the information I have now it seems like the circulation in the tank is a bit low. You mention if you shake the plants it falls off. Try to increase flow around the plants so the filters can pick up the debris. Now everything I say, below, is based off a 50% water change (assumed). If you are doing a 50% change then your accumulation totals are 42ppm NO3, 28ppm K, 7ppm PO4. The GDA could be from the heavy NO3. Now, if you are doing less than 50% water changes, then these numbers are higher. When I'm a bit too high on NO3, I will begin seeing GDA. I would dose around 10 to 12ppm per week, so my accumulation total is 20-24ppm NO3. I'm not familiar with Profito, is it a Micro mix? Are you dosing Micros such as Boron, Copper and so on? .25ppm Fe might be too low for a weekly dose, I'd be tempted to move that to .4ppm Fe a week. The other numbers look good (from EI perspective).

Just got home and both are zero and Nitrates are at about 1ppm. I completed my water change on Wednesday and dosed 3.93ppm KNO3 on Thursday.

It stands for reverse osmosis water. But to know how much to change we need to know the KH and GH of the aquarium or your tap water.

API sells a kit with both a GH and KH test.

Can you test GH and KH? If so, just doing small RO or distilled water changes can lower pH.

Will do.

Calling in the big guns! 😁

There was ammonia a while ago, but nothing now. I moved the fish in 6 at a time over 4 weeks. That said, I will check again to be 100% sure. Now that I think of it, I have been doing a lot of filter cleaning and gravel vacuuming. Spiking ammonia is likely. I was doing 60% to 80% twice a week and have now moved to 50%. So 50% for the last several weeks (15 to 17 gallons).

First grab a KH test kit so you know a baseline. And simply adding RO/distilled water to your source water will lower KH, and in return lower pH.

@Seattle_Aquarist How would you tackle a massive thread algae outbreak when using glut or hydrogen peroxide might/would damage moss and sensitive plants? This is where I'm heading. https://barrreport.com/threads/multiple-blackout-method-for-algae-control.6244/

Continued disaster.... The GLA reactor started leaking...took a week to get a replacement part... Modified my filter to increase turnover, and it vibrates just enough to make it too annoying... String algae continues.... Reduced lights...dosed some glut...moss and Guyana melted... I've bought everything I need to do several 3 day blackouts and I'm trying a few other things before going all in on it. Lowering the light only negatively impacted the plants so I bumped them back up to about 45%. I've added 22 Tangerine Tiger shrimp to the tank. Will this help? Can they survive a 4.8ish pH? Practice what I preach right? PH isn't a problem, right 👍. I have a SAE in QT now and if these 2 things can clear this tank... I'm scrapping it... Maybe @Beardedbillygoat1975can tell me if I just flushed 80 bucks down the drain with the Tangerine Tigers...

I haven't updated the 75 recently and don't have too much to report. Believe it or not, I have reduced some of the species and I'm still looking to do much more. My goal is to get it down to 12 or so. The problem I'm having is I'm trying to save some of the plants that I might be using in the 40 gallon, but the 40 gallon isn't going well and is delaying the final decisions. You should be able to tell that I have less red species which overall looks much better in my opinion. I've also returned to estimated index every other day dosing and have reduced my micro dosing to .4 Fe as proxy. I've noticed the reduced micro seems to have had a very positive effect on this tank and as such I've reduced all microdosing throughout the tanks that I have in the house. I also feel dosing over 6 days adds a bit more speed to growth and I prefer it this way. All of my Dwarf Rainbows made it through QT and all of the Oto's too. The tank has really come to life with activity and really feels like a community tank now. I'm looking forward to finalizing the plants and having them grow in. I need the inlets hidden! 😁 Interesting note. I removed my spatulata from the 40 (covered in algae) and amazingly, it was algae free in 2 days! I'm still struggling with BBA on the substrate and after reading some of @Seattle_Aquaristpost's, I will be adopting his strategy. I've ordered a few SAE's for both tanks and going forward, I will plan all tanks with the defense strategy in mind. I'm just not skilled enough to maintain an algae free tank on my own. I feel like this tank is about to look really good in the next month or so. I'm trying a carpet again and I believe the species is working very well with Eco Complete and should contrast well with this jungle style. I wil need to adjust the 53B and the right side is to similar, but those are possible 40 plants...so...

How old is the tank? How much turnover do you have? How much are you dosing all together (in ppm per week).

Lowering KH will lower alkalinity and it's as simple as adding 0dKH water to the water you are using.

It will not. The dirt substrate should have everything it needs at this point. You could dose bacteria to speed things up a bit.

I must say inert gravels are easier to work with and this Peace River stuff just appeals to my eyes. It's a bit pricey, but it's appealing!

I had an extra regulator and a tank laying around. She was jealous so she stole the materials. This worked in my favor as I'm trying to reduce the species count in the 75. 😁

Indeed it is. We love it! It checks off a lot of boxes.

My wife did a redo on her 20 tall. I thinks it's pretty good all things considered. From To

Use a plastic box of some type. Drill some holes the snails can fit through but not other fish. Add tasty food and put it in the tank. When they have lunch, remove them.

I wonder what they do about the air inside, outside and everywhere?

CO2 and O2 are independent of each other. I imagine adding so many fish is the true problem while on a very biologically young tank. My competition tank pH is 4.7 and my 75 gallon is 4.9pH. Nitrification continues at low PH, this has been proven in several studies. It can slow down nitrification in the beginning slightly, but it should have no real impact on the tank. In fact, the lower your pH is, the less problem your ammonia is going to be for your fish.

It's in the filters and substrate, not in the water.