[ITHURTZ]

Had these plants for I want to say a year or more, have grown tremendously from little java fern clumps and 2 small compacta amazons. They dont ever stay perfect though In the beginning the java fern sent out babies galore, then went necrosis. Gave it potassium and all went well for a bit. It keeps growing but the leaves now wont stay 100% green. The compacta used to get algae on the lower leaves but after excel (to test if c02 was a problem) no more algae (also have 30 nerites) but the lower leaves still slowly go clear from tip to nothing.

So now the specs. I have a 29gal with fancy goldfish setup to get the hang of things before I go planted with a bigger tank. Water change is 50% weekly, nitrates are 30-40ppm before change. I use co-op easy green twice a week , sun after water change, then another dose on wednesday. I also dose potassium via powder and use 1 teaspoon twice a week. I read to determine if you have a c02 deficiency use excel, so every day I dose 2 / 2.25 caps. Do I see a difference with that after 2 months? Yes, algae along with nerites pretty much doesn't exist in the tank anymore. Plants that used to shoot out 1 stem every 2 months are shooting out double that. (anubias) but the java fern necrosis still happens and the compacta old leaves still die off.

I also put osmocote plus capsules (about 12) scattered about the 29gal every 2 months. The light is a beamswork 6500k on a timer, 6.5hrs a day I think it is set at, I put pieces of paper under the light to help block some of it as maybe that could be the problem now? But wasnt in the beginning. Any idea? Things keep growing, it just dont stay lush green forever. IN the pics the compactas I havent trimmed any of the leaves off in atleast 6 weeks to give you the time frame this happens at. Substrate is sand

 

[ITHURTZ]

Oh ps. I put a hunk of java fern on a rock in my daughters tank many many months ago, she has no lights, no ferts just a betta neon tetras and 3 nerites sits in front of a south eastish window and her java ferns are flawless, takes up 1/4 of the 10gal.

 

[pauld738]

I think that's a pretty bright light for that tank. There's actually par data on this site for beamswork depending on the model you have and it's pretty impressive. Is that the DA that you have?

Do you have soft water by chance? Know your Gh?

In the beginning you might not have had a large enough plant mass to pull co2 from the system fast enough to show symptoms. With all the growth now you do. Also, now that you are dosing a carbon source it could be that another deficiency is cropping up (Mg? Ca?). Or it could still be carbon source. lol!

It could also be a trimming issue? Swords in particular benefit from regular pruning. I was trimming every 2 weeks back when I had Amazon swords in my tanks whether they needed it or not. Whenever I got lazy and didn't trim the old leaves would waste away.

On a side note, 2 teaspoons of K seems like a tad much for a 29 gal tank? You didn't mention what type but my fuzzy math has you around 40-50ppm weekly? EI recommends 20-30ppm (you only have swords and ferns, it's not like you have any demanding stem plants). If so it would be more of a waste than harm as you can go pretty high with K.

You could always get the Beamswork rise dim timer and cut the duration of 100% intensity down to somewhere in the 3 hr time frame, maybe even lower (?). Yet still have some viewing light, at say 40-50% intensity, for the majority of your day, say another 4-5 hrs. That's actually how I run my co2 tank. It's on for 7 hrs but only a portion of that is at full intensity.

You could also try and use some Salvinia (floating plants) to cut the light. Just not sure if your goldfish will eat them or not.

Just my thoughts.

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk

 

[Plinkploop]

My goldfish eat salvinia but not water lettuce, but I have fully grown comets (largest is 2 feet) so take that with a grain of salt.

 

[bigbadjon]

I believe you don't have a deficiency but your nitrates are too high. In a low tech tank keep your nitrate low (like less than 10ppm) and I bet many of your issues go away.

 

[Stan510]

Oof,isnt Excel also the algaecide? I would stop using that on ferns and mosses. Keep the potassium going,add iron glutamate- ferns love iron. Things should green up again.

 

[ITHURTZ]

This was my original post wow over 2 years ago.

Getting control on this gsa and potassium phosphate

4 months ago trying my hand at a low tech tank, so I have a 29gal in the dining room with 4 goldfish. Plants Java fern assortment of anubias Light Beamswork 30" DA 80 80x - 4800 lumen 64x 6500K, 16x Actinic First couple months was going great, ferns were producing plantlets and growing new...

www.plantedtank.net

I trimmed the amazons tonight, took alot out. Water looks cloudy always after a water change with this well water.

The light is indeed a 30" DA

GH KH are both 25 on the api test kit, pretty dang hard.

I just started dosing the carbon source in hopes I would find the deficiency! It has to be this super bright light!

The potassium I have is " sulfate of potash potassium sulfate, soluble potash fertilizer" , I honestly have no idea how much to dose, I dont quiet understand those diagrams so figured a teaspoon was close enough.

The next step up would be a 90gal and I would like to use this light, if I can use a dimmer on this that would be cool but hoping I can atleast approve the appearance in the next month or so before I go nuts on a bigger tank with more plants, some stem also.

I have what I think is a tiger lilly bulb that was growing tons of leaves and shoots to the top but I guess they were hungry last week because its just a bulb again.

 

[Plinkploop]

Lol my goldfish eat just about everything except for water lettuce.