# Alternatives to Bleach Dip?



## dannifluff (Jul 5, 2015)

Hi

I've ordered a few more plants to spruce up my tank and plant out a second tank. In my existing tank I have quite a bit of elodea, two anubias and two java ferns and a dozen or so marimo moss balls, which I set it up with.

The tank is recently cycled and the plants are going a bit mad, especially the elodea. They're soaking up the nitrates now which is good, however I'd like to trim down the elodea and use it to plant up my new tank, and add in a few more interesting plants so it isn't quite such a green stem jungle in the background  I've ordered rotala indica, rotala macrandra, some phoenix moss, some java moss, some new anubias and some frogbit. I'll be taking the marimo balls out when I put in the new plants.

Anyway, my frogbit arrived today and I thought I'd try out a bleach dip. It was 1:19 ratio and I left the frogbit in for 60 seconds only, rinsed and soaked in 3 x usual dosage dechlorinated water, rinsed again and have left in a window in a dechlorinated bucket with fertiliser and CO2 drops. It seems ok, however I'm not at all convinced I haven't destroyed the lot of it. I can tell it's had some stress on the leaves, but it's still green and floating so I'll see how it is in the morning.

After this process I really feel a bleach dip is a bit too hit-and-miss, but I want to disinfect the plants before putting them in. I don't really want to have to go out and buy anything else, but I do have Aquarium Salt and Distilled White Vinegar to hand. 

My question is, can either of these be used to make a dip that isn't quite so harsh on the plants? Has anybody had any success with a warm saltwater dip at all? If so, what ratio did you use and did you quarantine afterwards just to be on the safe side?


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## Watermelons (Jul 21, 2015)

http://blogs.thatpetplace.com/thatf...ping-plants-to-eliminate-snails/#.VbFWkOk5DnE

Not sure if im allowed to link external things?

Looks like AQ salt at 1cup/gallon might work?
Ive also heard of numerous people using peroxide for plant dips
Ive always used bleach, but recently noticed after adding new plants to my tank I have flatworms of some sort, and I bleached the plants pretty good.... Like 1:5 ratio... 
I'm tempted to start using 2 methods for my plants now


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## dannifluff (Jul 5, 2015)

Thanks for that link. I'll try out the salt dip method on the rotalas and the moss and quarantine them for a few days just in case!


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