Seachem fluorish tabs making water murky

[Rin_89]

Hi,

Been following the website for awhile and posting for the first time. Just wanted to say thanks for all the advice and knowledge.

I currently have a planted 65gallon tank with quite a few plants. I just started using seachem fluorish tabs and it's making my water very murky. Im using white gravel as substrate, co2 injection, LED nicrew lighting and the tank is fully cycled. The murky water doesn't seem to upset my discus or change the water parameters, just merely an eyesore. Is there anything that I can do to clear the water up? The tabs are buried ~1inch in the gravel. I have also attached an image for reference. The picture below doesn't really capture how murky the tank is.

https://imgur.com/a/I0vmI

[Ryan925]

Not sure the cause but you can use some purigen to clear the water

[Rin_89]

Not sure the cause but you can use some purigen to clear the water

Thanks for the advice, I'll give it a shot. I'm currently using carbon and bio rings in my filter canister.

[Ryan925]

A bag of purigen in your canister works wonders

[pitdogg2]

Those tabs need to be used in a non disturbed way. When i used them i had plants in clay pots. Cleaning gravel in a Discus tank you will always be disturbing them and yes they will cloud water.

[Rin_89]

I actually did an experiment yesterday where I just threw the tab in some tap water and let it sit for about an hour. It is causing my water to be murky since I'm currently using ~6 tabs in my tank. I'm thinking about making the switch over to dosing the tank weekly with Seachem excel. Would that be a better alternative?

[abla1958]

I've used these tabs for a long time and I'm currently using them and never had this issue. Did you put too many in? Or something else may be the cause.

[pamdb33]

I've had a similar experience with the Seachem tabs. Tho mine tend to turn my sand greenish, almost like an algae outbreak.

Seachem Excel can be used however I would suggest you check out metricide 14. This is a liquid CO2 (contains same ingredient as Excel, glutaraldehyde, only in a higher concentrate) It can be purchased at medical supply stores, you just have to remember to not add the little bottle of activator that comes with it.

You can find a good discussion on it here... http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/11-fertilizers-water-parameters/104038-metricide-14-replace-excel-dosing-2.html

[Ryan925]

I actually did an experiment yesterday where I just threw the tab in some tap water and let it sit for about an hour. It is causing my water to be murky since I'm currently using ~6 tabs in my tank. I'm thinking about making the switch over to dosing the tank weekly with Seachem excel. Would that be a better alternative?

Excel and the tabs are totally different things. Excel is a carbon supplement

When I first started my planted I was just using seachem flourish but that's not enough on its own. My plants really did well when I switched to the full line of seachem ferts and using their dosing calendar. Problem is that gets expensive real fast and is a PITA having to dose certain things one day and others another.

If you need ferts dry ferts are the way to go. I use the pps pro from Greenleaf. I got everything I needed for like $40 and its enough to last you a year or maybe much longer. The nice thing is you dose each morning before lights on. Always same dose. Essentially it is supposed to be what your plant load will utilize in a days time so wc shoudnt have any negative effects

With slow growing low light plants ferts may not be needed

[Rin_89]

I've had a similar experience with the Seachem tabs. Tho mine tend to turn my sand greenish, almost like an algae outbreak.

Seachem Excel can be used however I would suggest you check out metricide 14. This is a liquid CO2 (contains same ingredient as Excel, glutaraldehyde, only in a higher concentrate) It can be purchased at medical supply stores, you just have to remember to not add the little bottle of activator that comes with it.

You can find a good discussion on it here... http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/11-fertilizers-water-parameters/104038-metricide-14-replace-excel-dosing-2.html

Thanks for the info! I just bought two bags of sachem purigen to see if that'll help clear things up. I'm also not ruling out a bacteria bloom bit it would be odd considering I've had this tank running for over 3 months now. If all else fails I'm going to pull the root tabs up to see if that clears things up.

[Rin_89]

Excel and the tabs are totally different things. Excel is a carbon supplement

When I first started my planted I was just using seachem flourish but that's not enough on its own. My plants really did well when I switched to the full line of seachem ferts and using their dosing calendar. Problem is that gets expensive real fast and is a PITA having to dose certain things one day and others another.

If you need ferts dry ferts are the way to go. I use the pps pro from Greenleaf. I got everything I needed for like $40 and its enough to last you a year or maybe much longer. The nice thing is you dose each morning before lights on. Always same dose. Essentially it is supposed to be what your plant load will utilize in a days time so wc shoudnt have any negative effects

With slow growing low light plants ferts may not be needed

Thanks a lot for the info! I will definitely give this a go if the root tabs don't work out, which would a shame since my plants are doing really well. Also, I'm going to upgrade my light source to a current orbit USA LED lighting system for a better light spectrum. Would this be considered a high light source? Are you mixing all the dry ferts into one bag and dosing every morning? How are your discus handling these doses and if I over dose are there signs I should be looking for?

[Davidzil]

They shouldn't cause a problem if you are using them under the roots in the substrate.

[Ryan925]

Thanks a lot for the info! I will definitely give this a go if the root tabs don't work out, which would a shame since my plants are doing really well. Also, I'm going to upgrade my light source to a current orbit USA LED lighting system for a better light spectrum. Would this be considered a high light source? Are you mixing all the dry ferts into one bag and dosing every morning? How are your discus handling these doses and if I over dose are there signs I should be looking for?

I have a current USA satellite plus pro on my planted and love it. It does put out a lot of light but the benefit is you can adjust to whatever intensity you need. The four presets are pretty good but you can also customize.

My discus tank is no longer planted but I was dosing with no issues. I eventually removed all the plants and gravel for better growth. I now have a planted tank also but not a planted discus tank.

If you buy the full kit it comes with two bottles. One for macro one for micros. You fill bottle with distilled water and add the amount of dry ferts according to their chart. Each bottle is 500 ml so you don't need to be constantly mixing

[Rin_89]

I have a current USA satellite plus pro on my planted and love it. It does put out a lot of light but the benefit is you can adjust to whatever intensity you need. The four presets are pretty good but you can also customize.

My discus tank is no longer planted but I was dosing with no issues. I eventually removed all the plants and gravel for better growth. I now have a planted tank also but not a planted discus tank.

If you buy the full kit it comes with two bottles. One for macro one for micros. You fill bottle with distilled water and add the amount of dry ferts according to their chart. Each bottle is 500 ml so you don't need to be constantly mixing

Just wanted to give an update on my tank. I have placed two purigen bags into my canister for about 5 days now and so far, the water is really murky. I did about a ~25% water change a few days ago with also no luck. I even went as far as purchase a UV sterilizer for my tank thinking that it might be a algae bloom but so far, it's still looking murky. I'm thinking the last thing I can do is remove all the plants and root tabs from my tank to see if I can isolate the cause. Thoughts?

[Jarry]

I wouldn't remove the plants - I think that your substrate is way too large, the best for plants is 2-4mm. It could also be the cause of releasing melting tabs, which leads to cloudy water. I would maybe try to remove the tabs very carefully, maybe using siphon and then do a big water change. Seachem excel is not a fertiliser, you can try just Seachem Flourish + maybe some macros if needed, but I would probably try to keep lower light and Flourish might be enough then.

[Debow]

I use to use the seachem tabs but then switched over to the diy root tabs using osmocote plus and gel capsules. I have not had any adverse effects in the time I have used them. There is a bunch of videos on youtube about this.

[Rin_89]

Update: the tank is now crystal clear! The UV sterilizer had a slow start but ended up doing the trick. So what I'm guessing is that the tabs provided a spike in nutrients available in the tank and that's what caused the bacteria/algae bloom. I will have to play around with my light/CO2/nutrient balance to prevent this from happening again in the future. Thank you again everyone for all your advice!