Water clouds with Flourish Iron

From the Complete Thread: Water clouds with Flourish Iron



Polaris96
Relatively new to all of this. First let me thank everyone on this site and americanaquariumproducts.com for all of your advice. I'm grateful that there's plenty of real science going on here, in addition to the anecdotal stuff (which is just as important, but much easier to find).

I've got a 10gal planted freshwater tank with community fish (tetras, barbs, 1 gourami, and 2 corys) and some cherry shrimp. Currently using a gravel filter with sponges on the outlets. I add flourish excel every other day and a weekly dose of flourish and flourish iron.

The iron makes my water cloudy for about two days (sometimes three). Is this normal? should I reduce the dose? maybe spread it over several dosings? I doubt the dose is too high because I never show ANY iron content when I test the water (defaulting to the recommended 1mL/10gal)

The tank looks wonderful when the water's clear Anyone had this issue?


Carl
What are your other parameters?

I have not had this happen, but this seems to describe a precipitation out of solution problem (although not a big problem IMO).
The question is why this is happening; my thoughts are your Iron is causing the temporary precipitation of carbonates and calcium/magnesium, especially if your GH or KH is quite high

See also this SeaChem fact sheet:
Flourish Iron


Polaris96
ahhhhhh. yep. that's it.

I've got GH++ right now due to an idiot misread of the dosage on the Seachem Equilibrium bottle (it's embarrassing for an Engineer to admit he f'ed up the chemistry ... ) I dosed a 10gal tank with two tablespoons of Equilibrium. it was a serious error abd whacked my Nitrites in a day. I feel really bad about that.

tank, this morning was:
NH3 [34] 0.25ppm
NO3 0
NO4 10ppm
pH 7
KH 71.6
GH off the scale. My table ends at 214.8ppm for 12 drop titration. I need about 40 drops to kick on the test (API). (one of these days I'll graph the data and extrapolate the curve if the relationship is clear, but, for now, I'm just logging GH as 214.8++)

I've added a water softener pillow, which has caused the GH number to stop climbing, at least. I'm thinking it's gonna be a long haul of gradual dissolution until water changes carry out the overage. At least my local water is good for this (New York, Long Island) I've got high pH and Carbonate but zero magnesium or trace salts (no bedrock, here).

I don't see any way of dealing with this, save to let it run its course. At least nothing seems to be adversely affected (so far).

by the way, any idea why I get no measurable levels of Fe even directly after adding SeaChem Flourish Iron? I have tested with both RedSea and Hagen kits after assuming, incorrectly, that the reagent may have been off.


Carl
Did you mean PO4 rather than NO4 (I cannot think of any compound that NO4 stand for)?

I do not have an answer for testing of your Iron, as I have only added it via dosing, often via root tabs since this is a trace element...

I would not be too concerned about your GH as 200-300 is not even close to a dangerous level, as well GH is also necessary to prevent ph spikes during peak hours of photosynthesis and this cloudy water issue is only a temporary nuisance.
You could also try mixing the iron supplement in a gallon of your tank water than setting it aside for a couple of days to settle prior to adding to your aquarium.

See these articles for further information:
Aquarium Chemistry; pH, GH, KH, more

Planted Freshwater Aquarium Care

Polaris96
NO4 would be a pernitrate, and I'm not even sure if nitrogen will form one in the regular environment. Its goobledygook - I messed up. sorry for the confusion.

I should have written NO2 instead of NO3 and NO3 instead of NO4.

I have already read the articles you included, but thanks anyway for the links. It's obvious you put a good deal of analytical rigor into them and I've referred a bunch of my peers who have aquaria to them.

So refreshing not to hear another rant on, " Duuuuuuuuuuuuude my African Cichlids don't bother any other fish as long as I keep feeding them tetramin boiled for exactly 23 minutes in whale fat. They just SAY that crap about aggression to get you to buy another tank, maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan."


Carl
OK, I forgot all about this.
My understanding of NO4 pernitrate cannot exist because O (Oxygen) is always -2 in a compound

How did you test for pernitrate?

I have to admit I have never thought of or had a question about pernitrate, so my knowledge of this is very basic.


Polaris96
I meant to say I screwed up the empirical formula for Nitrates and Nitrites by adding an extra Oxygen radical to each. I didn't test for pernitrates; I just messed up the formula when I wrote the post.

The compound could, theoretically, exist, because Oxygen and Nitrogen are both anions ( "-" charged). It would require a cation group to balance the sum of the negative charges. That’s why nitrates and nitrites always exist as "something" nitrate (eg. Potassium Nitrate or Ammonium Nitrate). I know you know this already, I'm just throwing it in for the benefit of any interested hobbyists that might skim the post.

I don't think there are many naturally occurring cation groups that fit pernitrate charge criteria, but this is only a hunch. A Horticultural or Agricultural chemist would be our "go to" guy here for hard facts. I think you would already know about pernitrates if they were important.

By the way, has anybody experimented with Ozone to energize the Redox potential in aquaria? It has seen some usage in atmospheric recycling.


Carl
Ozone has been used in the past in the Aquarium Hobby to increase the Redox.
However the other side of the equation has often been overlooked in the hobby


Babygeige
I don't really have anything to add as to the science/chemistry aspect of this conversation, but I'm just curious what plants you have in your tank.

Generally from what I've read, most of the basic maintenance plants don't really require the addition of iron, they'll get enough of what they need from the trace amounts in water. Unless you're growing plants with red leaves and high light requirements, you may not even need to add this.

I haven't used any iron additives in my tanks yet. I've only just begun to consider it for my Narrow Leaf Ludwigia, only as an experiment to see if it would make a difference in its color.

.....it looks like you need the Iron in there, if only for the pogo and red ludwigia. I think I am going to try some for my ludwigia too. The leaves on mine have a slightly reddish tint to them, but I'm very curious to see how much the addition of iron would help.

I can't think of why iron doesn't show up on your testing though. I wonder if the bottle of additive is ok. Do they expire? Or perhaps you got a bad bottle...


Bikeguy
the iron tests DO expire....but that only makes it less sensitive....it should register something. the odds of 2 kits being off tho are astronomical. now i`m not a chemist....but could there be some other element in the New York water that is neutralizing the iron??? kinda like the ammo out that changes ammonia???

To continue reading this thread, please follow this link:
Water clouds with Flourish Iron

Also for plant lighting information, please see this top notch article:

*Aquarium Lighting

OR for Freshwater Care in General:

*Freshwater Aquarium Care, Cloudy Water Information

A Couples of suggested filters for planted aquariums:

Rena Filstar Filter and Parts

TMC Fluidized Filter