My plants are not thriving - any tips?

[Jrodiohead]

My Java fern especially is getting spotty and dying. My java plants used to bud so much it would drive me crazy but now they've all but stopped reproducing. I've also noted degradation in the overall health and growth of my other plants.

My nitrates are 60 ppm, which I know is high. However, my understanding is plants need nitrates to grow.

My pH is about 8.2

Nitrites and ammonia are 0 ppm

Can someone point me in the right direction? I'm tired of trial and error - emphasis on the error.


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[ImACoolguy]

Water change. Your plants need nitrates but you have too much that it can hurt your fish.

Water changes will also replenish trace elements that come from the tap water.

Do you dose any fertilizers?


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[azmodan]

Can you tell us more about your tank? Tank size, stock, lighting, photoperiod, any ferts/carbon supplementation/co2?

 

[Jrodiohead]

I've got about 7-8 guppies, a rainbow shark and a small breed pleco (not exactly sure which).

I have two T5 HO bulbs (8500k and 10000k) - I don't know the wattage sorry. I'm a poor historian.

My tank is a tall 20 gallon and I have a canister filter.

It was moderately to heavily planted but now it is minimally planted due to them dying off. If they go past the point of no return I just take out the plant.

I stopped the ferts s/p to nitrate levels.



I also hate to admit this but I've started to notice little fuzzy edges on my plants. I've never had an algae/bacteria/fungal problem.


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[Jrodiohead]

I don't supplement CO2 right now. Honestly I stopped buying it (liquid) because they were growing fine without it.

I'm wondering if I have "old tank syndrome". I've heard of something like it but I don't really know. Mine is about 3 years old.

I use the light about 5-8 hours a day. I don't have a timer unfortunately.



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[azmodan]

First off I'd recommend swapping out your bulbs to something in the 6500k range, as it's more in line with what plants need and use. The fuzzy growth you see appearing could be hair algae or BBA. What other sort of plants do you have?

 

[Jrodiohead]

Sorry it's foggy I just did a partial water change this afternoon.

I have java fern, amazon sword, cabomba, wisteria, and some grass looking type I don't know the name of.


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[Jrodiohead]

You can tell from my other picture I ripped out a lot of plants. Mostly java fern and the grass blade looking species. I only kept the semi-healthy looking plants.


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[ImACoolguy]

Do you put root tabs under the sword?


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[Caliban07]

You can tell from my other picture I ripped out a lot of plants. Mostly java fern and the grass blade looking species. I only kept the semi-healthy looking plants.


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What is your water change regimen?


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