Cheap plants, less nitrate! POTHOS

Yodins

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Aug 29, 2014
42
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Dang that's a lot of calculations

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vamptrev

Silver Tier VIP
MFK Member
Apr 23, 2007
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I figured i would need alot more. The plants i added grew about a foot in one week which shows they are deff eating nitrates but nothing noticeable enough for me to keep them. I dont have enough room in my sumps for more then 1 plant either.


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DIDYSIS

Mantilla Stingray
MFK Member
Feb 9, 2012
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I tried a bunch in my ray setup and didn't notice anything. Rays just seem to produce nitrates naturally. Mine also grew like crazy but overall were more of a mess and not worth it as they didn't seem to do anything.


I figured i would need alot more. The plants i added grew about a foot in one week which shows they are deff eating nitrates but nothing noticeable enough for me to keep them. I dont have enough room in my sumps for more then 1 plant either.


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Yodins

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Aug 29, 2014
42
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0
Trinidad and Tobago
Good news guys. Less than 3 days since u added the pothos plants to my set up my angels have signed. Whether or not it was triggered by the pothos plant or not is not worrying me.

All I'm glad about is that now I have 2 confirmed pairs of being Angel fish!!!

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Yodins

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Aug 29, 2014
42
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Trinidad and Tobago
Here are the pairs. The silver and black ones are eating the eggs but the white ones are actively protecting the eggs from the other inhabitants (more Angel fish) the white ones also deposited the eggs on the pothos leaves

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F1 VET

THE serrasalmus rhom
MFK Member
Nov 3, 2011
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INDY
My pothos doesn't look like they are growing any...leaves are kinda curled up a tad.
They take a bit to start growing with roots submerged. Just be sure to remove dead or yellowing leaves so the bulk of the energy goes to the healthy parts. Pic of setup?

I tried a plant in each one of my 450 gallon ray tanks. Im seeing no difference in nitrates so i will be pulling them out. Maybe for my bioload i would need like 10 plants in each tank to see a difference...


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Depends on how big the plant is and it won't start consuming n03 for a few weeks. 1 mature 3+ month plant with added lighting should eat 10-20ppm of nitrates per 50-70gals of water with a decent bio load. At least that's the ongoing consensus and results I've experienced.

Awesome thread!!!

Just added a bit of pothos to my new 120 :)

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Looks great!

How do you know if your pothos are taking to the tank water? The roots on mine is a bit darker then when I pulled it from the flower pot.
Give it some time and added light like a 8-12watt cfl bulb around 5000-6000kelvin. Like I said above I need more details on your setups. Many variables can affect the power of the plant.

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THE serrasalmus rhom
MFK Member
Nov 3, 2011
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I figured i would need alot more. The plants i added grew about a foot in one week which shows they are deff eating nitrates but nothing noticeable enough for me to keep them. I dont have enough room in my sumps for more then 1 plant either.


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I tried a bunch in my ray setup and didn't notice anything. Rays just seem to produce nitrates naturally. Mine also grew like crazy but overall were more of a mess and not worth it as they didn't seem to do anything.

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Rays are heavy eaters whom produce a large bio load, when you compare the efficiency of plant filtration vs a drip system/large & frequent water changes in a aquarium there isn't much of a comparison unless you want 4-6 plants with added lighting! You would need adequate room for the roots plus room for the actual plant so when were talking 400+gals with a large bio load realistically speaking unless your very into plants and love the look it's not the most effective option!

But keeping 1-2 plants after some time will help water quality plus help filter the surrounding air amongst other benefits. But pothos are never going to replace the efficiency of a drip system on such large tanks with big fish!

The information Dr SL provided and has given in the past puts it into perspective, that's some good research and statistics, sincerely appreciate your efforts!

If you imagine 4 adult Oscars in a 55gal pothos are only going to make a knick in the overall bio load, which we can assume with daily feedings is 120-150ppm per week but if the plant eats 30ppm n03 in a week that's a 20% or so decrease. Obviously this is a harsh example





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JK47

Retired MFK Admin
MFK Member
Aug 4, 2008
11,112
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Washington
Rays are heavy eaters whom produce a large bio load, when you compare the efficiency of plant filtration vs a drip system/large & frequent water changes in a aquarium there isn't much of a comparison unless you want 4-6 plants with added lighting! You would need adequate room for the roots plus room for the actual plant so when were talking 400+gals with a large bio load realistically speaking unless your very into plants and love the look it's not the most effective option!

But keeping 1-2 plants after some time will help water quality plus help filter the surrounding air amongst other benefits. But pothos are never going to replace the efficiency of a drip system on such large tanks with big fish!

The information Dr SL provided and has given in the past puts it into perspective, that's some good research and statistics, sincerely appreciate your efforts!

If you imagine 4 adult Oscars in a 55gal pothos are only going to make a knick in the overall bio load, which we can assume with daily feedings is 120-150ppm per week but if the plant eats 30ppm n03 in a week that's a 20% or so decrease. Obviously this is a harsh example





___________________________________________________
Go S.Vettel #1 Infiniti Red Bull Renault!

>R.I.P SPIKE!
>Get Better Schumi!

* http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?504763-Cheap-plants-less-nitrate!-POTHOS
Please don't give advice about rays and pothos/plant filtration unless you have both. I understand the intention is good but lets not perpetuate poor or assumed info by dropping numbers in an equation that does not apply with conventional fish and common MFK setups. 4-6 plants would do nothing for any ray tank that is well/properly fed. The members who posted this does run a drip system as do most of us and are very experienced members. Plants in a ray tank are useless unless done in an extreme way. None of which i have seen in this thread. If you don't own rays leave that for those of us who do please. I have many pothos plants and other plants that I have worked with in my rays tanks and still keep to this day.

We are lucky if drip systems keep up with rays lol.. plants are for looks for ray keepers.
 

gorak

Dovii
MFK Member
Dec 9, 2013
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mn
Pothoes do great things in a lot of setups. Having them in both my ray setups and in my other tanks I can say that yeah, they do nothing for rays. You need crazy amounts. It would be easier to make an algae reactor then to build a big enough filter to house enough plants to make a dent on ray waste.

I have not been able to stop messing with my filtration since having rays. Always looking to build and improve on it.

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