Starting new tank - codename Frankenstein - critique wanted

[Biollante]

Hi Florin,

Change your water and while you are at it use a nut pick or knife and poke and prod the wood in the aquarium to see if you can find any rot, loose stuff and so on. Remove all you can, it is a pain but you may have to remove the wood and prepare it again for use.

Until you find the source of the organic material there really is no point continuing the PP treatments.

Before the water change

1. Pour 25-ml of distilled, bottled, filtered water in a glass beaker.
   
   1. The idea being clean water without chlorine or dechlorinators.
      
   
   
2. Draw 25-ml of aquarium water from beneath the surface and
   
   1. Place it in a clean glass beaker.
   
   
3. Place 1-drop of the 0.1N PP solution in each beaker, swirl and cover, clean cloth will do.
   
   1. The precise amount is not critical, I am calculating the drop= ¹∕₂₀-ml.

The beaker with the distilled water is the control; the color should remain pretty much the same for at least 24-hours.

The beaker with the aquarium water is the test sample and the dose is approximately ^6.3mg∕_l the idea is to see how many drops are required to stay in the pink for 4-hours.

Biollante

[Florin Ilia]

1. YESTERDAY. PP Treatment Setup

I started by checking the volume of water and measured as precisely as I could the water column in the sump and aquarium. After accounting for substrate, hardscape and biomass my calculation yielded 125.7l - so yeah, 125 is pretty close

I then started the treatment and screwed up by forgetting to remove the AC pad that I had inserted the day before. I did remember to take it out after half hour and I don't think this had any major impact.

2. YESTERDAY. PP Treatment

The timelapse shows the evolution of color. The photos are taken at 5 minute intervals over the 11 hours duration of the treatment. The big white UFO is a plastic bucket cover. The changes of position are my kid bumping into the tripod



I did not supplement aeration but I did keep an eye on DO and it never dropped below 7.5 ppm (about 93% saturation).

2. YESTERDAY. Critters

The bucket cover had an unexpected side effect - it collected critters. I did not have the energy yesterday to take them out of the water for study but I took some footage of them in the water.

There are about 3h:30 between the reddish part and the yellowish part of the movie below. The reddish part is from when I dosed the 7th and 8th dose (simultaneously - after dosing I realised it's not a good idea). But apparently the "worms" didn't survive the double dose (the snails, the shrimp and the "water fleas" from the video did).



3. Other observations

At the late night water change I noticed many Anubias leaves floating away. The leaves look healthy except the very base of the petiole, which is rotten. Just when I thought things were getting on track! Apparently there still is plant melting going on.

4. TODAY

I added 50ml of deionized water (my own product! 1.40 μS/cm) to one beaker and 50ml of aquarium water to the other. 50 and not 25 because I can easily measure ¹/₁₀ ml, which is what I added to both about an hour ago. Since then I added 2 more doses and I will keep an eye on the water for further changes. I will post the results when the treatment done.

Rather than cleaning the manzy of bark I think it will be easier to start from fresh, bark-less pieces. I wasn't very happy with the composite "Frankenstein" log anyway. It will be a lot of work wasted but oh well.

Thank you for your help Bio!

Florin

[Florin Ilia]

14:45 Start of experiment (left - distilled water, right - aquarium water):



15:20 Aquarium water turned dirty yellow:



15:20 Added new dose. Did not appear to make water pink. What color is it though?



15:20 So I added another dose. The color is the same, just stronger:



17:00 Whatever color that is on the right, it seems to hold on for now:

[Florin Ilia]

19:10 At the end of the 4 hours the reddish color became a sort of orange:

[Biollante]

Hi Florin,

That tells us your water requires about ^12-mg∕_l PP to oxidize the organic material with added material.

So it would require about ^14-mg∕_l to ensure a ^1.75-mg∕_l for the therapeutic dose.

The odd color you are seeing in the test sample is the products of oxidation; if you were to pull it through a filter, you would likely see a color closer to that of the control sample.

• Assuming you do not have a sintered glass filter and vacuum pump,
  
• dropping a few sugar crystals in should turn the test solution darker,
  
• until it goes muddy brown, then yellow.
  
• Add enough and let it stand and it should become clear with stuff on the bottom of the beaker,
  
• the brown stuff being Manganese dioxide, just like the stuff in the alkaline batteries.
  

If remove the wood from the aquarium, top the water level off to determine the increase in PP required, then perform an 80% water change, wait a day and if it was the wood no more than two PP treatments should be required.

Do not think of the work involved; think instead about the mileage you will get from this.

• Assuming it is the wood, this will be one of those lessons well learned and
• You can nag people for the next 50 years about the consequences of improper preparation of wood for aquariums.
• That is how I look at my misadventures, great opportunities to well and truly annoy people!

Biollante

[Florin Ilia]

I did drop the sugar in that beaker, just to see if there's any truth to this so called science you keep invoking

Fortunately tomorrow I have a day off so I'll have time to remove the wood, untie all the anubias and bolbitis that adorn it atm, tie them to pebbles and drop them on the bottom of the tank.

The pebbles do not react to vinegar, cannot be scratched easily and look like this:

so I hope I'm not trading a variable for another.

I'll then follow the rest of your suggestions. I hope it's the wood, I have less than half of my PP left now

Thanks Bio!

Florin

[Biollante]

Hi Florin,

The rocks look like a good choice…

Though since there is still a chance it could be something else, may I suggest removing the wood with everything attached to a bucket until you have confirmed this madness.

You will know soon enough if it was the wood…

As to the science, ha, the Gurus have long since determined my science is but madness.

Polonius:
What is the matter, my lord?
Hamlet:
Between who?
Polonius:
I mean, the matter that you read, my lord.
Hamlet:
Slanders, sir; for the satirical rogue says here that old men
have grey beards, that their faces are wrinkled, their eyes purging
thick amber and plum-tree gum, and that they have a plentiful
lack of wit, together with most weak hams; all which, sir, though
I most powerfully and potently believe, yet I hold it not honesty
to have it thus set down, for yourself, sir, shall grow old as I am, if
like a crab you could go backward.
Polonius:
[Aside] Though this be madness, yet there is method in't.
Hamlet Act 2, scene 2, 193–206

Biollante

[Florin Ilia]

[ArnieArnie]

I wish this thread was started sooner! My fathers aquarium had similar problems and I could not find out the cause. I thought he was just lazy with EI or something. But when I felt the wood there were some soft patches on it, so I figured it was rotten and took it out just to be on the safe side. Now I have a more an idea why it was a problem tank. Thanks!

@Biollante: are there other threads that you know of that explain how to treat wood to prevent rooting problems?

[Florin Ilia]

This morning I removed all the wood and stored it in buckets (estimated volume: 10-12l). I left the plants tied. This uncovered A LOT of very fine, black wooden "dust" which looks like the bark "shedding" from the wood.

The tank looks pathetic now Before:



After:



I also decimated the surface plants. Plant biomass in the tank more or less halved:



Some of the anubias are in bad shape. Here's a representative Anubias leaf. looks healthy except the base of the petiole is rotten:





Is this plant healthy?:



Should I clean this mess up?:



Anyway, Bio, two questions:
1. Is it still relevant if I perform the PP test this evening, 8 to 10 hours after "surgery", instead of tomorrow? Today I have more time.
2. Is it OK to insert the Osmocote now? It will leach some NH3 iirc and of course other inorganic nutrients.

Thanks,

Florin