Chemical Filtration

[calihawker]

Hi
I'm running 2 filstar canisters, an xp3 and an xp4, on my 300 gallon display and I was wondering besides foam blocks and chemstars, what other chemical media are people using? Also is it worth it to load up the unused trays with more media for biological filtration?

Steve

[GrillMaster]

What exactly do you have in this 300G display tank? Fish, plants? Media, the more the merrier! No chemicals though, just a place for bacteria to adhere to.

[calihawker]

Well right at this moment the only thing in the tank is a big piece of driftwood and flourite. The plants get delivered in about a week (I hope) Here's the list:


Eleocharis acicularis
Echinodorus tenellus
Bolbitus heudelottii
Aponogeton boinianus
Cryptocoryne balansae, wendtii, lutea
Rotala indica, wallichii
Anubius barteri, nana
Amazon swords
Ozelot swords

On the fish wish list (say that 3 times fast are a large school of rummy nose, the usuall cleanup crew and of course discus.

Steve

[pcsb23]

Steve, no chemmical filtration media should be needed. It always makes sense to have some activated carbon on hand, but with the amount of w/c's it's not necessary as a rule. I have never found it to be necessary to use any chemical filtration in a discus setup.

Once you get the plants growing, and I like the list, it should then be a case of managing the ferts dosing and w/c's.

[GrillMaster]

Plant list looks good!

I have foam, ceramic and floss in my XP3. Works very well for me.

tc
Mark

[calihawker]

Thanks Paul!

Hey Mark. what's floss??

Steve

[GrillMaster]

Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner!

I call polyester fiber (floss). Walmart sells it in the crafts dept. in a big bag for a few bucks.

Lfs's call it filter fiber, its pretty much the same stuff. I got it at the lfs.

tc
Mark

[limige]

where'd you order from?

[calihawker]

Hi limige
Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. I have a good friend who runs one of the big wholesale companys in the S.F. bay area.
I own a machine shop and we're doing trades. Machine work for livestock. Good thing too since stocking this big tank would be quite expensive.

Steve

[limige]

ic, interesting, what kind of work do you guys do? i'm a machinist myself.

[calihawker]

We're a job shop. Mostly high production, close tolerance turning and milling. All CNC stuff. My friend at the wholesaler has a part for an automatic bagging machine that needs to be replaced frequently. It's a pretty simple milling part but the manufacturer charges big bucks for it. I can produce them in quantity dirt cheap.

Steve