once-a-week Dry Dosing?

[perryny]

I wanted an easy way to fert my 5-gal community tank, but found myself drawn to the idea of dry dosing. In reading the dozens of posts on the subject, I came across this thread on another forum http://www.barrreport.com/estimative-index/2817-non-co2-methods.html , which initially seemed like the perfect solution for me. Once-a-week dosing, without the need for weekly, 50% water changes and plant growth would be minimal (preferable for me and my 5-gal.)

However, after reading through several times, I'm still confused and hoping someone can clear things up. Referring to this statement in the post, which addresses a user asking how to dose his 75 gal:

"So, add 1/4 of the KNO3, 1/8 of the KH2PO4, SeaChem EQ -1/4-1/2 teaspoon each week and if you forget one week, that's likely okay too.

Note plant health as your test guide"
​

So, trying to convert this down for my 5-gal, I wound up putting 1/4 tsp. KNO3, 1/8 tsp. KH2P04 and 1/4 tsp. Seachem EQ in a 500ml bottle of distilled water and will dose about 30ml once per week.

Does this sound about right to anyone?
Looking back, maybe I should have just went with a couple of different bottles of Seachem.

Thanks all.

 

[jcardona1]

i dose everyday, so im not too good with all those calculations. but take a look at Chucks planted aquarium dosing Calculator. it might be useful:

http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_dosage_calc.htm

 

[perryny]

Tried that... it made my brain hurt.

Why does he split up the nitrate and potasium (in potasium nitrate) as seperate ingredients? I have a bag of potasium nitrate - how do I dose this in seperate amounts?

sorry if my questions are ignorant. I've just been reading a lot on this and I'm just not getting it.

 

[jcardona1]

Tried that... it made my brain hurt.

Why does he split up the nitrate and potasium (in potasium nitrate) as seperate ingredients? I have a bag of potasium nitrate - how do I dose this in seperate amounts?

sorry if my questions are ignorant. I've just been reading a lot on this and I'm just not getting it.

lol i know the feeling man, and i have no idea! thats why i just followed the daily dry dosing guidelines found on plantedtank.net. its not that bad when you get used to doing it everyday. and it's worked great for me. thats my tank in my avatar

 

[perryny]

I've gotten very familiar with your awesome tank. It seems like every thread I visit looking on answers on how to dose, there you are. As a matter of fact, it was one of your posts that led me to the barrreport forum.

I'm tempted to do the daily dosing - I think it's mostly the weekly, 50% water changes that are putting me off.

It just seems like the proposed solution from Tom Barr and Diana Walstad is perfect. If only I could figure out how to scale it down. Maybe I should just get a bigger tank.