Agree w/Tempest again. Also a 55, plus a 29, divided some stands of Crypts from other tanks for the new super-substrate tanks... and watched them die, slowly, slowly. They did not even melt. I learned my lesson - not even the Val (55 only) did well until after some months. With peat and or mulm or both, you can avoid the planted version of NTS.
using peat moss under flourite good or bad?
- Thread starter Jamie
- Start date
So where would one buy appropriate peat? I've been getting things ready for a 90gallon I've got and I'd like to add peat in the substrate. Do you just get it from a garden supply?
Local garden center or home store, plain ordinary Canadian Sphagnum Peat. It comes from about 1 cubic foot or less packages up to 4-6 cubic foot bales (price per unit volume inversely related of course). If you do not garden outdoors, you want the smallest available. No additives ot fertilizers, just sphagnum peat.
I don't use loose moss, I use _ground_ peat, like Scott's brand etc. Yes, the cheap stuff in the garden centers.
Small amounts on the very bottom layer seldom get into the water and ground peat is fine and looks like detritus if you pull it up.
A small amount helps add a little organic material, helps to start a reductive environment etc. This is a good thing in the beginning. I don't add much, it will not make or break a tank, but the mulm is more important for new tanks IME/IMO.
Regards,
Tom Barr
Small amounts on the very bottom layer seldom get into the water and ground peat is fine and looks like detritus if you pull it up.
A small amount helps add a little organic material, helps to start a reductive environment etc. This is a good thing in the beginning. I don't add much, it will not make or break a tank, but the mulm is more important for new tanks IME/IMO.
Regards,
Tom Barr
Joe - the difference is in the development of "maturity" in the substrate. peat in the filter has zero effect on that. If you want tannins and humic acid in the water column, the filter use is the way to go (I do not). The substrate use of peat and mulm (as Tom Barr, Tempest, and I have tried to point out, apparently unsuccessfully) is to get the plants started without the normal and expected new tank lag time before good growth and normal development. The use of both materials all but completely erases the normal and expected start-up period, being more like a simple plant move within an established tank. The use of either will help.
Tom has not to my knowledge put a hard figure on his use (I had to rough guess from his "handful"). But I'm a detail nut, so my use is a measured 1/2-2/3 cup of ground peat per square foot of tank bottom. That is a 1/2-2/3 cup measure, not packed, knifed off to level, spread and mixed into the lowest <1" of substrate. The different volumes are based in part on the intended plantings - if deep substrate and/or many crypts, it is the large volume - I don't think that is particularly sensitive. Whether or not that is a large amount is subjective, but it does not tannin-stain the water to any noticeable degree, nor do I see peat fibers on top of the substrate. I normally use about 4" substrate depths on tanks >12" tall, so it pretty deeply buried. During and after a large scale replanting (a rare thing in my tanks), I have some suspended mulm, but it will settle or be filtered out within less than an hour.
Tom has not to my knowledge put a hard figure on his use (I had to rough guess from his "handful"). But I'm a detail nut, so my use is a measured 1/2-2/3 cup of ground peat per square foot of tank bottom. That is a 1/2-2/3 cup measure, not packed, knifed off to level, spread and mixed into the lowest <1" of substrate. The different volumes are based in part on the intended plantings - if deep substrate and/or many crypts, it is the large volume - I don't think that is particularly sensitive. Whether or not that is a large amount is subjective, but it does not tannin-stain the water to any noticeable degree, nor do I see peat fibers on top of the substrate. I normally use about 4" substrate depths on tanks >12" tall, so it pretty deeply buried. During and after a large scale replanting (a rare thing in my tanks), I have some suspended mulm, but it will settle or be filtered out within less than an hour.
That is the whole object of the peat/mulm addition. If you are patient, the tank will "mature" within 6 months +/- anyway from fish and fishfood waste. I am not patient when I have an easy way around it, thanks to TB.
Flourite is a wonderful substrate, its microporous structure seems near-ideal for roots, but it just hasn't had the opportunity to build up the goodies that an older tank would have, nor will the pH and O2 gradients be established immediately. The peat/mulm helps with both those things.
The same efect can be gotten with gravel/laterite with the peat/mulm addition. But Flourite is forever, and I have to rework gravel/laterite every 1-3 years, depending on the plants in that particular spot. The Flourite may still need some excess root removal from Crypt/sword/val areas, but not recharging with fresh material as I do with laterite. I still have more gravel/laterite tanks than Flourite, but anything being completely restarted is very likely to change over.
Flourite is a wonderful substrate, its microporous structure seems near-ideal for roots, but it just hasn't had the opportunity to build up the goodies that an older tank would have, nor will the pH and O2 gradients be established immediately. The peat/mulm helps with both those things.
The same efect can be gotten with gravel/laterite with the peat/mulm addition. But Flourite is forever, and I have to rework gravel/laterite every 1-3 years, depending on the plants in that particular spot. The Flourite may still need some excess root removal from Crypt/sword/val areas, but not recharging with fresh material as I do with laterite. I still have more gravel/laterite tanks than Flourite, but anything being completely restarted is very likely to change over.
In the olden days before laterite/flourite etc, we often were told/it was mentioned that a gravel was not good for growing plants for at least a year or two. It needed time to mature.
Well, what needed time to mature? The rock sand/gravel? Or the bacteria and organic material? By siphoning that and adding it to a new tank, I would in effect, have the same thing after a short period of settling in.
Regards,
Tom Barr
Well, what needed time to mature? The rock sand/gravel? Or the bacteria and organic material? By siphoning that and adding it to a new tank, I would in effect, have the same thing after a short period of settling in.
Regards,
Tom Barr
