If you have soft tapwater (GH and KH of 3 or below), I think that mixing a calcium mineral source with the soil before setup is a good idea. In setting up tanks in the past, I mixed dolomite lime (CaCO3 and MgCO3) with the soil (a few tablespoons of powdered dolomite lime per gallon of soil)...

Recently, I increased water hardness in my tanks with growing guppies, plants, and molting shrimp. This is because the well water I use went from a GH of 10-17, when I last measured it back around 1991 and 2007, to a too-low GH of 3. The decrease was due to continuous rainfall last few years...

The main question I'll start with here is that we want to increase water hardness so that plants get macronutrients Ca, Mg, K without adding a lot of NaCl. Also, I have advised people to use CaCl2 to harden water, not CaSO4 or commercial products that are loaded with sulfates. To harden up...

Hi Folks, I'm new around here so if this question has been posed before, please point me to the relevant thread(s). What do you consider to be the optimum Ca:Mg:K ratio (in the water column) for planted tanks? Having been reading around, it seems that 3:1:0.5 is preferred by some people. I am...

So I've been struggling over a couple questions I have about what are some proper levels for different nutrient specifically Ca and Mg. I've been reading that levels of Ca in a planted tank should be around 30ppm. Is this correct? I've also read that a GH of around 100ppm is ideal. Wouldn't...