rassta

hi i would like to know if its ok to use the red clay 5 to 10 percent plus use flourite red in the soil,i been mineralising my dirt and it is highly organic ,

its suggested that you use a high cec value through out the soil and flourite is ok to use,so i was just wondering do i still use the red pottery clay as a sludge through the soil,

i cant find anything relating to this, my concern is will i have too much iron using both

my soil is from my vege bed ,has lots of compost through it and old cow manure

i have followed the recipe for the mineralising , it has no smell and is looking very fine now

only a few days left till it ready

this site has been so helpful to me and i have read and researched alot now

thanks
hope to hear from someone ,,

Maryland Guppy

Flourite's CEC rating is so low it really doesn't count.

mistergreen

Dirt itself has high CEC.

hoppycalif

The iron in clay isn't available to the plants until bacteria work on it. You don't need to worry about having too much iron from the red clay.

rassta

thanks !!

TropTrea

For years I had been using red clay. I will only use it though when I initially set up the tank. I will take the damp red clay and role it into little balls just enough to cover the bottom of the tank. about the size of peas then lat them harden. once hardened I'll mix them with # 20 or finer red flint gravel (1 part clay to 5 parts gravel by weight.) This is the base of my substrate. I will then cap this with additional red flint gravel.

Note sometimes I mix the red flint gravel with black diamond to get a darker colored gravel.

After that I mainly use liquid fertilizers for the plants. I used to use CO2 but with some of modern lighting and fertilizers I'm getting good results without it.