[Kosmonaut]

Hi,

I am having some seriois problems with my plants. Hopefully someone can tell me if this is some kind of defficiency... In the last weeks I bought new plants,

from Dennerle "normal" Echinodorus and

from Tropica "1-2-Grow", Pogostemon Erectus, Alternathera Reinickii Mini, Hygrophila Araguaia, Heteranthera Zosterifolia and Staurogyne Repens.

The Pogostemon and Hygrophile were bought 4 weeks ago, the proceeded to melt almost completelly in the first week, the Hygrophila while not melting is growing albeit very slow. I was expecting the POgostemos to grow slowly but not to melt.

After two weeks I decided that I needed hardier, easier to care plants, so I got the Heteranthera, Staurogine and Alternathera. The last was more an experiment and I was hoping that the other two would healthily grow, and the did. The Heteranthera was almost explosive the first week, it grew tripled its size in just 6 days and te Staurogine was looking very healthy.

SUddenly last week the problems started, the plants stoped growing and even started melting, please take a look at the attached pics...

I am dosing EI, TNC Traces and Excel. The tank is 40 Liters and I am doing 50% water changes every sunday. Tanks is already stablished, it was set up around 20 months ago. The only change that I made was that I stoped dosing Magnesium Sulphate, because my water is hard, about 14 dGH.

Could this be the cause?

Cheers and thanks for your help

 

[Kosmonaut]

Bump?

I am asking because this is really confusing. It looks like a Potassium or Magnesium deficiency. But both Echinodorus had root root tabs placed at planting time. I am dosing macros and micros, tested for Nitrates and while I know that tests are not accurate, at least they show a difference before and after dosing and this doesn't looks anything like Phosphate deficiency. That rules out macros from my point of view. This has to be in theory a micros deficiency, but I am dosing a little bit more than the recommended amount. As I said before the only change that I made is not dosing Magnesium Sulphate anymore because I am worried that my water hardness is already high, around 14 dGH, but such a deterioration in just a week seems a bit extreme? I tested yesterday and dGH is at 12, so not low...

I would really be happy to have any help with this, the plants are not growing and starting to melt. I don't get it, the Heteranthera is supposed to be very fast growing and undemanding and it sits directly below the light. It is melting now... the Staurogyne and other green plants have a yellow coloration/white discoloration. Only the red plants seem to be doing fine, but they are not fast growers...

Should I start adding Magnesium Sulphate again? Or increase the Potassium dosing?

From what I have been reading an overdose is very unlikely with the amounts that we use and 50% water changes are done every 7 days...

As additional info, I am using excel (1 ml/40 l) and the aquarium only filter media is purigen. Lighting is not hight, but this would just mean slow growth. Not injecting co2, but again, plants only grow slower...

What am I doing wrong here?

Thanks for your help!

 

[Nordic]

Alternathera melts like nobody's business, have one here rotted to pulp before I even took it out of the little plastic pot thingy. Supposedly needs high light and CO2. I have a similar looking weed in my garden, wonder if it would work.

 

[Kosmonaut]

Its doing fine, the green plants are not doing well...

 

[OVT]

Alright, what are your water parameters, including temperature? How old is your AS?

Logically, IFF the only change was stopping Mg then starting dosing it again should fix the problem. Personally, I doubt it.

Please keep in mind that adding a bunch of new plants has its own risks. As you can see, many of them tend to melt in the new environment. Melting plants release unknown amount of nutrients - now is a good time to re-check your water.

Heteranthera (Star Grass) prefers soft water. It is an "easy" plant once it starts growing in your tank. Before that, it melts and fast.

I would take 2 - 3 healthy, green tops, 2- 4" long and let it float. Once it starts growing and puts out long white roots, plant some of it. Establishing Heteranthera in one of my tanks, 1' away from its home tank, took multiple tries and over a month. Once it started growing in the new tank, I could not trim it fast enough.

You can do it.

 

[Kosmonaut]

Hi,

I will check al my parameters today and post later, even if I am quite sure that they are very unacurate...temp is around 24° C or 75.2° F. Substrate has been there since the beginning of the tank, so about 18 months. I gather that it is already depleted and that caused the First Great Melt, about six months ago... after that came the First Great Algae Bloom, and since that the tank has been slowly recovering. So at a given point I started dosing ferts, excel, got purigen, and when things were looking nice and clean again I added new plants

This is the second time that I try Star Grass, the first time is was not so nice looking. I believe that it was because I was not dosing anything and only using the substrate nutrients. But didn't melt and was growing a lot.

I will be doing a 50% water change, like every Sunday, would it be advisable to go 75 or 80%...

Thanks and keep the ideas coming!