using nylon stockings to add peat to a tank without mess?

I've got a question...
Some folks I know have recomended that I put peat into an old nylon stocking
and drop it in my tank (or canister filter). This has been suggested as an
easy way to treat the water with peat without fillingt the tank with the
fine peat powder...

Has anyone tried anything like this? I don't want a ton of the fine dust
floating around in the tank, but I want to have peat in the tank..... I've
been pre-treating my water when I do water changes, and its a drag....

another suggestion was to charge a diatom filter with screened peat instead
of diatom powder, and just run it.......

thanks...
--JD

On Apr 9, 6:33 pm, "jd" wrote:
I've got a question...
Some folks I know have recomended that I put peat into an old nylon stocking
and drop it in my tank (or canister filter). This has been suggested as an
easy way to treat the water with peat without fillingt the tank with the
fine peat powder...

Has anyone tried anything like this? I don't want a ton of the fine dust
floating around in the tank, but I want to have peat in the tank..... I've
been pre-treating my water when I do water changes, and its a drag....

another suggestion was to charge a diatom filter with screened peat instead
of diatom powder, and just run it.......

thanks...
--JD

Until the small openings of the nylon stocking get clogged, this will
work, as would any other filter media bag. Peat comes in different
forms and concentrations. My preference has been to use peat pellets,
I think they were marketed as an accessory for Fluval filters, but
they would work in any filter compartment able to take a loose filter
bag. The pellets are quite concentrated (faster acting and they take
less room in the filter) and they also won't clog the bag, but it's
probably the most expensive way to go about it if you are doing this
on an ongoing basis, so ymmv.

The better question (imo) is why do you want or think you need to be
using peat? I'm usually found in http://groups.google.com/group/The-Freshwater-Aquarium
if I don't get back here in time to see you reply (and with your cross-
posting, I don't even know where 'here' is).

cheers
NetMax

Until the small openings of the nylon stocking get clogged, this will
work, as would any other filter media bag. Peat comes in different
forms and concentrations. My preference has been to use peat pellets,
I think they were marketed as an accessory for Fluval filters, but
they would work in any filter compartment able to take a loose filter
bag. The pellets are quite concentrated (faster acting and they take
less room in the filter) and they also won't clog the bag, but it's
probably the most expensive way to go about it if you are doing this
on an ongoing basis, so ymmv.

The better question (imo) is why do you want or think you need to be
using peat? I'm usually found in http://groups.google.com/group/The-Freshwater-Aquarium
if I don't get back here in time to see you reply (and with your cross-
posting, I don't even know where 'here' is).

cheers
NetMax



I use the stocking method to soften the water before it does into the
tank. I fill a bucket with very hot water, let it stand for 24 hours to
get rid of the Chlorine, add treatment for some of the other Chlorine
derivatives, and put in a stocking filled with broken up peat briquette.
Leave for another 24 hours, and viola, softened water. By doing it this
way, I don't clog up my filters as much.....

Rob.

I used to use a similar version, but on a larger scale for my discus
aquarium. I took some pictures and put them on my website he
http://www.marksfish.me.uk/index.php...ask=view&id=63. It
is a few years old now, but I still get the odd email saying how well it
works for others, may be worth a look? Of course, it can also be scaled up/
down for whatever size tank you have.

Regards

Mark

I'm doing something like this now, but want to avoid the whole "big bucket
of water" thing, and be able to go from the tap right tothe tank (my water
is OK, just needs a bit of softening). the idea was to use the stocking in
the tank itself insteadof in a pre-treating bucket..
-JD

"Marksfish" wrote in message
...
I used to use a similar version, but on a larger scale for my discus
aquarium. I took some pictures and put them on my website he
http://www.marksfish.me.uk/index.php...ask=view&id=63. It
is a few years old now, but I still get the odd email saying how well it
works for others, may be worth a look? Of course, it can also be scaled up/
down for whatever size tank you have.

Regards

Mark

Cool... ow much peat escapes from the stocking to the bucket? I was hoping
to be able to put the peat right into the tank (in the stocking) and avoid
the pre-treatment thing....

--JD

"Jaden" wrote in message
...

Until the small openings of the nylon stocking get clogged, this will
work, as would any other filter media bag. Peat comes in different
forms and concentrations. My preference has been to use peat pellets,
I think they were marketed as an accessory for Fluval filters, but
they would work in any filter compartment able to take a loose filter
bag. The pellets are quite concentrated (faster acting and they take
less room in the filter) and they also won't clog the bag, but it's
probably the most expensive way to go about it if you are doing this
on an ongoing basis, so ymmv.

The better question (imo) is why do you want or think you need to be
using peat? I'm usually found in
http://groups.google.com/group/The-Freshwater-Aquarium
if I don't get back here in time to see you reply (and with your cross-
posting, I don't even know where 'here' is).

cheers
NetMax



I use the stocking method to soften the water before it does into the
tank. I fill a bucket with very hot water, let it stand for 24 hours to
get rid of the Chlorine, add treatment for some of the other Chlorine
derivatives, and put in a stocking filled with broken up peat briquette.
Leave for another 24 hours, and viola, softened water. By doing it this
way, I don't clog up my filters as much.....

Rob.

I'm doing something like this now, but want to avoid the whole "big bucket
of water" thing, and be able to go from the tap right tothe tank (my water
is OK, just needs a bit of softening). the idea was to use the stocking in
the tank itself insteadof in a pre-treating bucket..
-JD


Although the stocking works, you have to remember that the peat will compact
with a lot fewer pathways for the water to run through unless you can give
it a squeeze every now and again to break it up. If you do that though, the
chances are that you will have sediment enter the tank. Another thing with
continually running the water through the peat is that your pH will
continually be dropping and you won't have a great amount of control,
possibly leading to a pH crash. This doesn't generally happen with the more
expensive aquarium peat you can buy, but garden peat can have a ph as low as
5!

Another potential possibility could be to fluidise it as you would a
phosphate remover? Don't know what it would be like and you would have the
same lack of control over the pH, but you wouldn't get the "tracking"
through the peat as you would with the stocking.

Last thought. How about something like a nitragon which fits to the tap, but
instead of a nitrate removing resin you had peat? I'm sure something
reasonably easy could be built along those sort of lines.

Mark

yea yea yea, so what........do you want to grow plants in peat moss or
add peat to a fish tank, its irrevalent at most, personally I would
use roundup and kill the freaking weeds and plants and go bare
bottom........ya know show the tanks bare bottom like Derek shows his
ass all the time in the moderated group of the pond clowns.....

On 9 Apr 2007 16:22:20 -0700, "NetMax"
wrote:

On Apr 9, 6:33 pm, "jd" wrote:
I've got a question...
Some folks I know have recomended that I put peat into an old nylon stocking
and drop it in my tank (or canister filter). This has been suggested as an
easy way to treat the water with peat without fillingt the tank with the
fine peat powder...

Has anyone tried anything like this? I don't want a ton of the fine dust
floating around in the tank, but I want to have peat in the tank..... I've
been pre-treating my water when I do water changes, and its a drag....

another suggestion was to charge a diatom filter with screened peat instead
of diatom powder, and just run it.......

thanks...
--JD

Until the small openings of the nylon stocking get clogged, this will
work, as would any other filter media bag. Peat comes in different
forms and concentrations. My preference has been to use peat pellets,
I think they were marketed as an accessory for Fluval filters, but
they would work in any filter compartment able to take a loose filter
bag. The pellets are quite concentrated (faster acting and they take
less room in the filter) and they also won't clog the bag, but it's
probably the most expensive way to go about it if you are doing this
on an ongoing basis, so ymmv.

The better question (imo) is why do you want or think you need to be
using peat? I'm usually found in http://groups.google.com/group/The-Freshwater-Aquarium
if I don't get back here in time to see you reply (and with your cross-
posting, I don't even know where 'here' is).

cheers
NetMax




-------
I forgot more about ponds and koi than I'll ever know!

On Apr 10, 9:47 am, "Marksfish" wrote:
I'm doing something like this now, but want to avoid the whole "big bucket
of water" thing, and be able to go from the tap right tothe tank (my water
is OK, just needs a bit of softening). the idea was to use the stocking in
the tank itself insteadof in a pre-treating bucket..
-JD

Although the stocking works, you have to remember that the peat will compact
with a lot fewer pathways for the water to run through unless you can give
it a squeeze every now and again to break it up. If you do that though, the
chances are that you will have sediment enter the tank. Another thing with
continually running the water through the peat is that your pH will
continually be dropping and you won't have a great amount of control,
possibly leading to a pH crash. This doesn't generally happen with the more
expensive aquarium peat you can buy, but garden peat can have a ph as low as
5!

Another potential possibility could be to fluidise it as you would a
phosphate remover? Don't know what it would be like and you would have the
same lack of control over the pH, but you wouldn't get the "tracking"
through the peat as you would with the stocking.

Last thought. How about something like a nitragon which fits to the tap, but
instead of a nitrate removing resin you had peat? I'm sure something
reasonably easy could be built along those sort of lines.

Mark

Mark, I'm glad you replied because I was thinking of that article you
wrote, and you saved me the trouble of finding the link. I'd still
question what is trying to be achieved, and what are the current water
parameters. Depending on the kH, the right peat solution varies from
a little in the filter, to pre-treatment in storage tanks, to not
using peat at all.

NetMax

Cool. I'm not planning to have a huge flow over/through it - more looking to
just drop it in a corner of hte tank behind some plants and let it do its
thing.

The tank already has a bunch of peat in it, so I'm not too worried about a
bag of it changing the chem - mostly just trying to make sure the "old" peat
(under the gravel with UGF) doesn't get completely depleted and the
chamistry get wonky....

For what its worth, the peat did a great job dealing with hard, high Ph
water... The fish are happy enough to be breeding pretty constantly, and th
plants won't stop growing (with a plain old hardware store grow light in the
standard cheapo hood as the only light source)........ Its a 125, so its got
a lot of inertia anyway....



thansk again - mostly I was just trying to figure out if anyone had tried
the nylon thing, and if it kept the peat mostly contained (I hate that black
layer on top of everything, and it *can't be too good for the gills....)

thanks again
-_JD


"Marksfish" wrote in message
...
I'm doing something like this now, but want to avoid the whole "big
bucket of water" thing, and be able to go from the tap right tothe tank
(my water is OK, just needs a bit of softening). the idea was to use the
stocking in the tank itself insteadof in a pre-treating bucket..
-JD


Although the stocking works, you have to remember that the peat will
compact with a lot fewer pathways for the water to run through unless you
can give it a squeeze every now and again to break it up. If you do that
though, the chances are that you will have sediment enter the tank.
Another thing with continually running the water through the peat is that
your pH will continually be dropping and you won't have a great amount of
control, possibly leading to a pH crash. This doesn't generally happen
with the more expensive aquarium peat you can buy, but garden peat can
have a ph as low as 5!

Another potential possibility could be to fluidise it as you would a
phosphate remover? Don't know what it would be like and you would have the
same lack of control over the pH, but you wouldn't get the "tracking"
through the peat as you would with the stocking.

Last thought. How about something like a nitragon which fits to the tap,
but instead of a nitrate removing resin you had peat? I'm sure something
reasonably easy could be built along those sort of lines.

Mark