crinum root rot

[crazycat]

i just had to throw out 2 crinum thianum bulbs because i realized that they were no longer growing, and the leaves that existed were slowly dying. when i pulled the bulbs out, the roots underneath the bulbs were rotted away and there was a foul smell. i had had these plants in a previous tank, with much less light and they had flourished. the current tank has 4wpg, injected co2 and is heavily planted. i do weekly water changes and am using travis' dosing schedule except that i don't dose nitrates b/c mine are always at about 12-13ppm (i have a heavy bioload). the only thing i can think of is that they were crowded by other plants--i have a huge amount of jungle vals--andmaybe they blocked the light from the crinums?

does anyone have any ideas? it's such a shame b/c they were such dramatic plants

 

[TankGirl]

I read somewhere on the Krib once that these bulbs are very sensitive and do not like to be moved - had you moved them recently? That is all I know about them, really.

 

[crazycat]

yeah--i moved them a bunch when i first set them up in the new tank. that's when they started to go downhill i guess--that was in july. i'll look for that info on the krib. thanks!

 

[travis simonson]

I have noted some plants have a serious (and I hope malkore will comment on this) allelopathy - meaning they have the ability to fight or damage other plants with roots near theirs. This hasn't been studied or documented very well from what I know, but, in my experience, some plants are very good at out-competing other plants with roots near theirs. Whether this means that they emit chemicals that hurt the roots of nearby competitors or they simply draw the nutrients away from competing plants is yet to be determined, but again, in my experience, some plants simply do not do well when planted in close proximity to other species. You might try planting the C. thianum bulbs in an area where they are not competing with other plants to see if this is the case.