Amazon Sword - Cobweb-like Leaves But New Ones Sprouting

Flourish nitrogen will be the only other product you need as the standard flourish contains potassium, and you don't want to increase your phosphorus.

It is unfortunate that Seachem refer to Flourish as a 'comprehensive plant supplement'. Here is their full description of this product:

"Flourish® is a comprehensive plant supplement for the natural freshwater aquarium. It contains a rich assortment of important micro elements, trace elements and other nutrients." No mention of the macro nutrients! In fact, it only contains small quantities of the macros, as follows:

Total Nitrogen                        0.007%
Available Phosphate (P2O5)     0.01%   
Soluble Potash (K2O)              0.37%

If nitrate in the tank is already, say, 40ppm or greater, then it may not be necessary to supplement nitrogen. And, in a recent post, I do believe that @fcmf has high phosphate. But, @fcmf would appear to already have Seachem Flourish, so let's start with that and see how things unfold. Between @Matt and myself, we'll get you there, @fcmf.

JPC

Watch this...
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqnso2aFm5g" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqnso2aFm5g</a>

What's your nitrate level?

I'll add the Flourish for now but am a bit reluctant to add nitrogen as I'm keen to keep my nitrates low. Will keep you posted...

Hi @fcmf

It would be very helpful to know your current nitrate level.

JPC

I've always struggled to read the liquid-based one - comparing a tube of fizziness .v. a plain card, so I always use a test strip as well. Collectively, these tend to suggest that nitrates are 25 or under, with tap water at 0.  However, I'm really not keen on allowing them to be any higher than that.

Hi @fcmf

I'm very surprised that you get "fizziness" with your liquid nitrate test kit. I've never seen that with the liquid test kits that I use (JBL, Tropic Marin and AquaCare). If you can maintain nitrate between 15ppm and 25ppm, then that should be fine. I also seem to recall that you were concerned about the phosphate level in your tank. Do you have any phosphate figures that you could share?

JPC

Nitrate test is Waterlife.

Quote from: fcmf on November 20, 2019, 07:25:12 PM

I have an API home testing kit for phosphates, and, from that, discovered that the tank and tap water measures out at 5 ppm! The unit options are 0.0, 0.25, 0.5, 1.0, 2.0, 5.0 and 10.0. The first time I tested, it looked closer to 2 but has been 5 (or almost 5) on the few occasions tested after that.

Thanks for the info.

JPC

Quote from: jaypeecee on November 20, 2019, 03:47:13 PM

The only specific nutrient that Easy-Life mentions for their Root Sticks is iron. They also make reference to 'clay sticks'. From this I deduce that these sticks are made of laterite.

As an update, I contacted Easy-Life to find out what their Root Sticks contain and their response was that "the clay of Root Sticks (montmorillonite clay) contain about 8% iron oxide and about 2% potassium oxide." Hope this is a helpful update for anyone reading this thread.

Hi @fcmf

OK, so it's not laterite. Seems that it's montmorillonite clay. But, from what I've read, montmorillonite contains neither iron nor potassium. Now that you have Seachem Tabs, let's just forget about this Easy-Life product. Shall we? Those in favour, say 'aye'!

JPC 

I know plenty of people that have snail and use Seachem Flourish if that helps put your mind at rest @fcmf

Thanks, both - and you're a star, JPC, as that paper (plus the other one you posted yesterday for Sue) is exactly the nature of evidence I like to read.