Hey all,

I've been struggling in this tank against algea, I hope to win the battle someday, but that's not what I'm posting here about.

The back of my tank has the following plants:

* Vallisnaria
* Pogostemon stellatus
* Rotala HRA/orange juice mix (mostly hra)
* Limnophila sessiliflora
* Bacopa Compacta

So as you can see on the picture below the sessiliflora is growing very nicely and I have to trim it every week.
But the rotala which has been in the tank longer seems to almost not grow.

The pogostemon hasn't been in the tank that long so I can understand that it's not surfaced yet above he wood.
The bacopa is starting to show up, but it's a slow grower so that's normal I guess.

Any idea why the rotola isn't growing faster? Is it because the sessiliflora grows to fast and takes away light?

I have co2, chihiros wrgb2 60cm, I dose 8 ml all in one fert per day which gives me around 10-15 ppi no3



Thx

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Bump, would love to get an answer about the rotola not growing good

Not saying I have much experience with this and it's most likely that the rotala doesn't like it's neighbors but it would help to know tank volume (20 gal?) and which all-in-one one you are using?

Also knowing your Gh makeup would help as well. Both total value and the Ca:Mg ratio. Just to rule out any wild card issues.

I will also add that myself and the tanks I follow that use an all-in-one on high energy setups dose somewhere in the neighborhood of 6-8x recommended dosage. Depending on the all-in-one used.

That can get difficult to do if your nitrates are high due to other factors.

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200 liters or 52ish gallon, all in one is something local Planted Box all-in-one (https://planted-box.com/product/all-in-one/)

Gh is around 14, that other I have no drop test for. Kh is around 8
When dosing the 8ml per day that gives me around 5-15 no3 it's very difficult to read, colors are so alike.

But I'm waiting for the powder ei dosing to come in stock on the above website and I'm gonna try that. What I have noticed is that the day after I trim the sessiliflora and did water change the rotala is looking great, nice and red and then it goes back to more orange. I should maybe switch the position of the rotala/pogostemon with the sessiliflora but that is something I'm not sure I want to do atm.

Hmm! This might be your big clue. As your tank seems deep from front to back, it could likely be that when the sessilifora gets tall, it completely shades out the rotala from the narrow strip of light at the middle of the tank. Shade vs no shade from neighbors make a lot of difference in the levels of light hitting a plant and these rotalas generally need a lot of light to trigger that popping red and fast growth that you read about. @pauld738 might have a point about not liking neighbors. “Ey, lim. You mind not hogging all that light to yourself over there??”

If you don’t want to move the plants, what about moving the entire strip of lights closer to the back half of the tank? Might even work out better for your algae issues if algae is popping up on the slow growing front plants or unplanted substrate.

Or you may just have to trim more often. .