[alcimedes]

I rescued a really beat up anubias from another tank. The new leaves coming in look great, nice healthy green and no holes in the leaves. How long should I leave the old, tattered leaves on the plant before trimming them off?

Or should I just leave them indefinitely even though they're kind of ugly?

I was going to wait until the plants had at least 4 new healthy leaves and then trim back the older, beat up ones, but I'm wondering if they're helping the plant growth enough that I should keep them there instead. The ottos are still cleaning off the algae on the leaves, but there's nothing they can do about the holes.

edit: This might help, found a photo. How bad off are those old leaves?

 

[WaterLife]

From my understanding, if the leaves have unrepairable damage (holes, etc) it's best to just cut them off right away, otherwise the plant will just waste energy/time/nutrients trying to repair what can't be repaired rather than using that energy to grow.

But if it's just a deficiency I think the leaves can recover so I guess you could leave the leaves of.

Sounds like the tattered leaves are in poor shape though, so you might want to cut them off. Sucks that the leaves do take a while to come back though (slow growth rate plants).

I've heard of people cutting all the leaves off if they all look bad and the plants still grow fine. I myself prefer to leave at least one leaf on.

That's just what I've gathered from my limited research on plants. Best wait for more knowledgeable replies.

 

[philipraposo1982]

Cut all leaves keeping only the nice ones. Keep the plant out of direct light and give it time.

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[WaterLife]

Just saw the picture now. Yeah I'd cut those bad leaves off (yellow, brown with holes) leaving only the healthy green ones.