Palmfiber Peat soaked in Chemicult as a substrate.

Somehow that makes sense. All the people in Gauteng complain about the PFP leeching in their tanks and tossing the stuff out, but the people down in the capr (where we know you have softer water) don't seem to have this problem.

 

I tried it in my 5ft and did WC every second day, eventually switched it off and packed it up. The water was like coke colour....

 

Yeah. So if you did WC with RO water it would have solved that problem. Or perhaps reduced the high kh by preparing the water in a large drum and add HCl to reduce kh...

 

Hi Lauré,

No, this makes no sense, humic acids leach out of PFP or peat regardless of whether the water is hard or soft. If you look at the Cape streams which are soft water they are chocolate brown as a result of the humic acids that leach from the plant material and the whole of the Amazon which has very soft water is loaded with humic acids and is brown.

Although the humic acids may appear to be unpleasant in that they make the water brown they are actually a huge advantage for fishes besides the advantages that PFP has for the plants. They reduce bacterial infections and have all sorts of other advantages. Also, if you want to feed your plants via the water column you will have to do water changes so then the humic acids fade away in any case so I would advise folks to carry on and then the brown colour problem will subside, I think the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages. If you see that the ADA aquasoil warns about this then it also tells you that they use peat or PFP in that medium and we know that it works but is expensive, but it contains organic peat which is the major advantage for the aquatic plant roots which is exactly what PFP actually also contains but is obviously much cheaper.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

Hi prof

Do you think one can overcome the water discolouration problem by leaching the PFP before using it?

May be one can try adding water to the PFP after it was swelled and letting that stand for a few days in a bucket, then do a WC in the bucket. Once the water clears, dry the peat and then add Chemicult, allow it to swell and then use it in the tank?

 

I just don't understand this leaching problem. Are you guys using the correct PFP? Are you capping it properly?

I've had "some" discolouration issues once, and it was picked up quite quickly while filling for the first time. Solution? Fill tank 25%, then drain. Repeat until water is clear. Took me about 5 fills of 25% and have not had an issue since...

 

I havent tried the PFP technique myself, but I have read on numerous threads/forums of there been leaching despite proper capping?

 

"proper capping" is a relative term...

Whenever I helped somebody with leaching issues it eventually became clear that there was one or more small sections that was not capped with at least 2cm of whatever was used for capping. Also note that gravel will not make a good capping. You need pool filter silica sand or smaller like play pen sand or river sand.

 

Hi ak47,

From the time that I announced this method, I informed folks about the leaching, and I have also indicated that it is more beneficial than negative, as a matter of fact the benefits are huge and after a few water changes the discolouration stops. If you were keeping discus for example you would add peat extract to make the water brown and then the fishes would be better off. You have stated elsewhere that you have added rain water to your water and the fishes have benefitted from the softer water, so these are obviously soft water fishes that you are keeping. If you have some humic acids leaching from the pfp these fishes will also say woophee, so this method will not only benefit your plants but also your fishes.

If you want to use the method, the decision is yours, but it has major advantages.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

Hi Dirk

Thanks for all the info I greatly appreciat it
If you intend to only keep a planted tank and no fish could you add the hydroponic fert directly to the tank water and keep it at a specified EC as in hydroponics ? Also if you were not worried about water discoloration as in not a display tank but propogation tank would adding extra Humic and Fulvic acid be recommended ? Also would you recomend liquid seaweed for its auxin and cytokines help ?

Thank you

 

Hi Benj,

No, you should definitely NOT add the hydroponic fert to the water column. Chemicult or Nutrifeed as it is now called contains Ammonia which is not good in any aquarium regardless of whether you have fishes in it or not, this can stimulate algal growth, and most importantly, the iron in this mix is not stabilized and is oxidized to Fe3+ which is not available to plants. So you must use an aquatic water column fertilizer or else you will have deficiencies in the plant fertilizer mix that your plants need.

You must ALSO NEVER use any of the liquid seaweed mixes because this are loaded with salt, sodium chloride, which is bad for aquatic plants and they do not need any auxins or cytokinins (note spelling, cytokines are something completely different and are signalling proteins use by your immune system) either, they produce more than enough on their own.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

Hi Dirk.
If I use this subsrate and wanted to make a 'hill' in one corner of my tank, could I just use the PFP to create the hill, or is there a maximum depth that should not be exceeded with the PFP? The other option would then to build up the hill with some sort of inert material, added a layer of PFP on top of this, then cap with the gravel I want to use.
TIA

 

Hi guys,

Just a head's up on this, the name of Chemicult Hydroponic Nutrient Solution has changed to Nutrifeed. It's still made by Starke Ayres. The packaging now looks like this:


Cheers
Gordon

 

Hi @darryn

To maybe answer this as best I can as Dirk is on sabbatical so it seems, he once told me that one should put gravel on the tank base where one wanted to make the hill, put a 3 cm layer of PFP on the gravel and then cover with gravel again. Hope this helps you and others to solve your problem.

Regards


Jason

 

I actually want to dig out my pfp and go back to old reliable sand and top with my fluorite. The pfp makes everything awkward. Gravel vacuuming included. My base was also originally slanted high in the back, shallow front, now it's all level, and in scraping to the back I'm always worried of digging up and dislodging the pfp.

Another thing that has occurred a few times is my flow pump suckers dislodge and the nossle points into the gravel, by the time I get to correct it, gravel quarry has been producing a steady mined steam of palm fibre laying over everything.

These are maybe just some of the con factors to take into account when hoping pfp. At least then you are fully informed.

Cheers

Sent from my iClone S2

 

Hi Ferryman,

In order for someone to take your comments into consideration, I think that you need to tell us how long this aquarium has been running with PFP.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

Sjoe prof, very long I guess. Since sometime back when this thread started and I was still very active. Probably 1 or 2 years ago.

Pfp as a medium is a good thing, no doubt, my only irk was always the delicacy one needs when vacuuming or sticking new plants in the soil

Maybe I just lack the finesse of underwater planting, I'm better at bonsai and gardening

Sent from my iClone S2

 

Hi Ferryman,

If your PFP has been getting along as long as 2 years, you should have thought of replacing it by now.

I recently renovated a tank in which I had placed PFP two years before and in which I had planted Cryptocorynes. They really grow well in PFP and after two years, this is what the roots looked like. What I did was I removed the plants from the tank with the gravel and then I used a hose pipe to spray away the gravel and the PFP. You can see one of the nails, completely rusted, into which the roots were growing in order to obtaining iron.



What you can see is that the root development in crypts in pfp is phenomenal, but I used a certain amount of water column fertilization as well, which is what I would recommend in any case.

You mention that you have had a problem with your filter pipe sucking up PFP because your suckers got unstuck. This is actually a very rare problem and it is not a problem of the PFP but of the suckers, so I do not really think that this is a valid criticism of the pfp method.

Kind regards,

Dirk

 

Not the filter pipe luckily. Just one of those in-tank pump things to add current to the water. It's quite a fiasco when those things get loose from the side of the tank and fall to the bottom, churning up gravel.

The hosepipe method seems a good idea I had been contemplating myself for a while now. Those crypts are rooting very well, nicely done!

Don't misunderstand prof, I'm not knocking the pfp substrate idea at all, just sharing my misadventures with it. If a new user tries it out they'll know: go easy on digging in the gravel vacuuming, also, beware of current pumps blowing out the top capping. And, plant plants carefully, trying to avoid digging up pfp when rooting the plant

Sent from my iClone S2

 

Maybe your gravel cap isn't thick enough?
I've got a 3cm cap on mine and I think I would actually struggle to make a hole deep enough to get down to the PFP. Granted, I haven't uprooted any large plants yet, but I haven't had any of it escape whilst adding new plants or removing small ones.