# Excel dosing - daily or every other day?



## AquaAurora

I cannot give experience on everyday vrs every other day, but in my tank 10 gallon tank (would call medium-ly planted with a lot of slower growers (java ferns and anubias)) I have been doing 1 ml excel everyday (including water change day (about 40-50% removed)) for 5 weeks. It's had no adverse effects buuuut its not magically cured/slowed my algae either (diatoms hisss).


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## sowNreap

I started off dosing every day (was using Excel but now using an equivalent - Omnicide). I'm now only dosing every other day. Several months after changing my dosing I started getting some algae. I think it was because my light got lowered & I had a flow problem in that are. I've corrected both & gotten rid of most of the algae so I'll see what happens from here on out. I have high-low to low-medium light level and dose a modified EI dose once a week.

I never did the extra big dose after a water change. Just used the same regular dose of 1ml per 10 gal. I do have some sensitive plants such Vals & Anacharis though I acclimated them to Excel slowly before doing full doses.

Edit: I should note that I consider my tank heavily planted now .. of course it wasn't that was several months ago since the plants have grown so much.


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## LetsGoFishin

Glutaraldehyde has been a great alternative to me since I don't use CO2.

I do a daily dose of 25ml undiluted Metricide 14 in my 50g medium light (approx. 40 par) tank. This is equivalent to 43ml Flourish Excel. This gives great plant growth for me, the fish are unaffected, and best of all zero algae issues.


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## Raymond S.

I have an Odyssea dual bulb T5 on my ten g tank which the PAR chart says has
100 PAR @ 15" and in a ten it is 12" high. I do keep the tank partially shaded by Giant Duckweed. But this tank, by all normal reasoning should be over run/w algae and has
a small amount that I like it to have when I use the Excel in it to balance it out.
I have been using 1ml every day for over 6 months now but am thinking on doing 2ml
per day just to see the results it gets. Nothing extra at water change but I really don't think it would do much of anything if only used every other day.
If you wait for a sale at Petsmountain their price plus shipping is still less than in stores in most cases. With the shipping right now it's $13.72 for the 500ml.


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## sowNreap

You can get a gallon of Omnicide from e b a y for $20.99 .. search item # 350979710474. I've ordered from this seller twice now & both times have shipped quick & had no problems. The photo shows Metricide but the title says "CIDEX METRICIDE OMNICIDE 14-DAY STERILIZATION GALLON". I just received my 2nd order a couple days ago & received Pro-Advantage which after Googling was formerly called Omnicide .. just changed names.


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## sleepswithdafishez

Thank you all for your input.I was asking because I had some problems due to DiY CO2 imbalances ,not dosing any macro ferts ,light too close and overdosing Fe + traces.
Mostly hair algae ,some BBA ,and diatoms on glass.

I was asking because I hear people are overdosing it at 2x dose daily.I have Red Cherry shrimp in the tank ,and noticed a lack of activity/reproduction/some deaths - when dosing 1 ml daily.

My tank is indeed 10g ,but water column is only 25 liters out of a total of 40 - be it around 6.5gal ; so now I dose 0.5 - 0.6 ml daily.
Also started dosing macros (following EI low light weekly) ,raised the light ,gave up on yeast Co2 ,and added some fast growers. - so I am aware Excel by itself won't treat the cause ,only the effects.

People state that their algae turn red - is that only for BBA? Some hair algae have started to turn white ,but nothing turned red.I am afraid to overdose because of the shrimp ,and some Vals ,which ,to my surprise ,haven't melted.


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## mfurufuru

LetsGoFishin said:


> Glutaraldehyde has been a great alternative to me since I don't use CO2.
> 
> I do a daily dose of 25ml undiluted Metricide 14 in my 50g medium light (approx. 40 par) tank. This is equivalent to 43ml Flourish Excel. This gives great plant growth for me, the fish are unaffected, and best of all zero algae issues.


Equivalent to 42ml for a 50g? I thought it was 1ml per 10g. Do you have any issues dosing do much ? I usually dose 5ml daily on my 40b. 

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk


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## Hoppy

I'm dosing 10 ml per day on a 65 gallon tank, and not seeing any problems. I was dosing half of that for a few weeks, but increased it to see if that would improve the plant growth. It has, but not by much.

When API started selling their Excel equivalent they did testing to show how much better it was than Excel. But, the only real difference was that they tested it with Vals, and didn't do the 5 ml per 10 gallons starting dose, which seemed to stunt the Vals with Excel. That convinced me that it is much better to dose the 1 ml per 10 gallons, and dose every day.

I may increase my dosage to 15 ml per day soon. I use low to low medium light so algae isn't a big problem in any case, as long as I manage to do tank maintenance as I should.


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## sleepswithdafishez

Hoppy said:


> I'm dosing 10 ml per day on a 65 gallon tank, and not seeing any problems. I was dosing half of that for a few weeks, but increased it to see if that would improve the plant growth. It has, but not by much.
> 
> When API started selling their Excel equivalent they did testing to show how much better it was than Excel. But, the only real difference was that they tested it with Vals, and didn't do the 5 ml per 10 gallons starting dose, which seemed to stunt the Vals with Excel. That convinced me that it is much better to dose the 1 ml per 10 gallons, and dose every day.
> 
> I may increase my dosage to 15 ml per day soon. I use low to low medium light so algae isn't a big problem in any case, as long as I manage to do tank maintenance as I should.


Could it be that Excel isn't the cause for my shrimp deaths then?

I have hard water ,GH-15 ,KH 10.High TDS also.The shrimp were multiplying fine until I started dosing Fe+traces also containing some K.It contained Cu ,also ,maybe it got cumulated in the water?Or the ferts I am dosing at the moment(P and K) from seachem ,make the water even heavier?

I did small water changes for a period of time ,and wasn't dosing the whole range of ferts ,only the micros - I have 20 ppm NO3 in my tapwater ,and I thought enough PO4 was produced by food and excrements at that time.
I used DIY Co2 ,not in the proper way ,also kept light too close ,so I think some kind of deficiency must have appeared ,and the fluctuating Co2 triggered algae -plants didn't adsorb Fe+traces and it charged the water even more.

When I first started dosing Excel ,I didn't realise I was dosing for only 6.5 gal water column ,I dosed 1ml ,as per 10 gallons -full tank capacity.After which ,less shrimp ,a few deaths here and there ,even the Amanos went in hiding ,and huddling eachother ,sometimes twitching their flippers ,as shrimp do when they are berried.The amanos still live ,but I don't see that many Red Cherry anymore.Now I dose 0.5-0.6 ml every other day.

In the end ,I am not sure if I should continue with Excel ,to increase the dosage ,or dose the actual quantity daily.If dose every other day ,isn't that similar to actual Co2 fluctuating?Maybe I'm making it worse?


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## LetsGoFishin

mfurufuru said:


> Equivalent to 42ml for a 50g? I thought it was 1ml per 10g. Do you have any issues dosing do much ? I usually dose 5ml daily on my 40b.
> 
> Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk


 No issues whatsoever. At 7 months since I started my tank it is now approaching heavily planted and requires weekly trimming. The initial algae issues have subsided significantly. I may get just a tiny bit on the glass that I have to wipe down every month or so but that's about it.

I don't use CO2 so that's why I dose so heavily. Most report good results at dosing 1ml Excel strength glutaraldehyde per 1 gal tank water. I also run a split photo period with 3 hrs off in between, allowing some of the depleted CO2 to naturally replenish. In addition I add the first half of the glut dose before the first photo period and then the second half of the dose just before the second photo period. Don't know if this helps much but it does keep the total concentration more equal throughout the day.

I'm stocked with 45 fish, over half are neon tetras and then the rest are rasboras and blood fin tetras and a handful of ottos. They all seem to do quite well and are unaffected by the glut.


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## herns

sleepswithdafishez said:


> Dosing instructions of Flourish Excel recommend dosing daily or every other day ,1 ml for 10 gallons.
> 
> In which case should you dose daily? - larger tank ,heavily planted ,algae issue ,high tech tank ? ,and what would the difference be ,between dosing "daily" and "every other day" ? ( is it meant for the more sensitive plants?"
> 
> Excel is said to dissipate in 24h ,so ,wouldn't the "every other day" dosing lead lo imbalances? - or is it meant for the more sensitive plants?
> 
> Is the stronger dose - "1 cap(5ml) per 10 gallons after water change" a must, ,or can you dose 1ml per 10 g ,all the time?


use Metricide its a lot cheaper. google or search here "Metricide vs Seachem Excel".


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## redant

Been dosing at 1ml per day for 15G tank. Just been a few days. Everything's ok so far...besides I am not having any algae issues till now.


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## Hoppy

sleepswithdafishez said:


> Could it be that Excel isn't the cause for my shrimp deaths then?
> 
> I have hard water ,GH-15 ,KH 10.High TDS also.The shrimp were multiplying fine until I started dosing Fe+traces also containing some K.It contained Cu ,also ,maybe it got cumulated in the water?Or the ferts I am dosing at the moment(P and K) from seachem ,make the water even heavier?
> 
> I did small water changes for a period of time ,and wasn't dosing the whole range of ferts ,only the micros - I have 20 ppm NO3 in my tapwater ,and I thought enough PO4 was produced by food and excrements at that time.
> I used DIY Co2 ,not in the proper way ,also kept light too close ,so I think some kind of deficiency must have appeared ,and the fluctuating Co2 triggered algae -plants didn't adsorb Fe+traces and it charged the water even more.
> 
> When I first started dosing Excel ,I didn't realise I was dosing for only 6.5 gal water column ,I dosed 1ml ,as per 10 gallons -full tank capacity.After which ,less shrimp ,a few deaths here and there ,even the Amanos went in hiding ,and huddling eachother ,sometimes twitching their flippers ,as shrimp do when they are berried.The amanos still live ,but I don't see that many Red Cherry anymore.Now I dose 0.5-0.6 ml every other day.
> 
> In the end ,I am not sure if I should continue with Excel ,to increase the dosage ,or dose the actual quantity daily.If dose every other day ,isn't that similar to actual Co2 fluctuating?Maybe I'm making it worse?


When you dose fertilizers without also testing to make sure you aren't overdosing, you have to do regular big water changes to remove any excess of any of the nutrients. Otherwise, over time you can build up a high enough concentration of one or more of the nutrients and that can harm the shrimp. Red Cherry shrimp are very rugged, and will live in almost any water, but there are always limits to the maximum amount of various salts in the water that they can live with.


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