Calling all plant tank gurus, an interesting situation....

[hubbahubbahehe]

Hi all, I need your help with sharing your experiences.... Here it goes... I have a

40 G tank with 2 x 65 watt coralife fixture
and 100% flourite.
my ph is 7.0 with two bottles of diy co2 fed into two separate hagen ladder diffusers.
gh 7
kh 7
water change 20% each week.
The filtration is an eheim 2231 ecco.

My rotala rotundifolia, riccia, java moss, dwarf sag, green hygro and sunset hygro are growing great, but my corkscrew val, italian val and tiger val, and pearlweed have slowly melted over time..... what is causing this??? in my soil substrate tank, my val quadrupled in size and spread runners everywhere....now i can barely keep them alive. same thing with my crypts....they are barely holding on whereas in soil substrate they thrived. and i used to be able to grow pearlweed no problem,,, but now they are melting???????????? also....i planted my red tiger lotus with the roots in the substrate and the bulb sticking out. it's firmly held down... but some of the leaves are rotting....sometimes it's rotting on the leaf itself before it even gets big.....and i had one leaf try to go to the surface but it rotted at the stem before it got the chance to reach the surface and open up.... what is going on??? any help is much appreciated...!

Joey

[Aquaman]

Im no Guru but I think you might have answered your own question. The substrate doesnt seem to be providing enough nutrients to the roots. Do you have any livestock in this tank? If not then you could prob add some, or add some fert tabs/sticks to it and see what happens.

[wellbiz]

Joey,

What are your water fert levels. Nitrate, phosphate, etc. Have you tried some root tabs.


Jason

[hubbahubbahehe]

Hi guys, thanks for the replies, I appreciate it. You know, I do have a good fish load. about 20 guppies, 4 mollies, and 10 white clouds. I feed them once a day enough that they can finish in 5 minutes. I do not know my nitrate or phosphate levels, haven't dosed ferts in awhile.... haven't tried roottabs... i forgot i have jobes fert spikes for lush ferns and palms...perhaps i need to fertilize with that...??? i didn't realize that no root tabs mean melting plants? i guess cuz i have read many reports of people using 100% flourite and saying they don't have to fertilize at all..!! Anything else i should do besides add fert tabs?

[wellbiz]

Originally Posted by hubbahubbahehe

i didn't realize that no root tabs mean melting plants? i guess cuz i have read many reports of people using 100% flourite and saying they don't have to fertilize at all..!! Anything else i should do besides add fert tabs?

There are to many variables to say that you should always or never use root tabs... Rule of thumb is watch the plant health...

I would test your water... Do you add a trace fert?

Jason

[hubbahubbahehe]

no i dont i used to dose 1 ml iron every other day but then i noticed an overdose of iron.... i followed tom barr's suggestion of 1 tablespoon of kno3 every week after the water change...but it was resulting in too much nitrate in the tank and the fish were looking sickly....so i did massive water changes to reduce the nitrate in my tank....

[wellbiz]

Yep sounds like a fert inbalance...

[hubbahubbahehe]

ok i just want to make sure i get this right... the fert imbalance is causing certain plants in my tank to melt down?

[wellbiz]

Based on what you said, that is my best guess, but until you get some readings with your test kits its only a guess...


Jason

[hubbahubbahehe]

ok, you need nitrate, phosphate and what other test kit readings?

[wellbiz]

Originally Posted by hubbahubbahehe

ok, you need nitrate, phosphate and what other test kit readings?

Those are a good enough to start with...

[Buck]

hubba ya gotta feed them plants bro ! :shock:

The water column is fine...flourite pretty much only supplies your plants with a good supply of iron, but the root feeders still need other nutrients. Your plants used to get them from the soil *mother nature's* way... but now you are mother nature, feed them with flourish tabs, jobes, init sticks... whichever you decide to use, they are all good... but for gawds sake... feed em' :lol:
The rest of your plants are doing fine still because they draw most of their nutrients from the water column