Stunted, Algae, Deficiencies - Plant Help

[Squatchmen]

Well somehow I can't post any of my photos on here, but I'll list some of the problems I'm having with my plants, and would like to find solutions to them if possible

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Trimmed amazon sword, brown at cut and going down leaf, deteriorating as well

Algae is also growing on these leaves, algae is on all plants moderate to severe

Amazon leaves are curling, new leaves are small

Yellowing of leaves on an Anubias

Deteriorating leaves on Cryptocoryne

Small holes in Amazon Sword

Few leaves are falling off on Cryptocoryne

Twisted leaves on Cryptocoryne

Moderate to severe stunted growth in all plants

Deterioration / stunted growth of marimo moss balls

Bubbles coming up from substrate

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So if anyone has any good suggestions for me that would be fantastic, also I'm planning on getting another Finnex Planted+ LED fixture. For the time being, here are my tank specs:

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55 gallons

Ammonia (0ppm) Nitrites (0ppm) Nitrates (10ppm) Hardness (240) alkalinity (150) PH (8.0)

Marineland C-530 clean filter every 3 months

water change once a month (35gal) – 15% once a week x4

Flourish root tabs added once every 3 months

Stress Zyme added every 3 months

Monthly add Melafix and Pimafix

Weekly add Kent Blackwater

Mon, Wed, Fri, Sat – potassium nitrate, phosphate, sulfate (1/2tsp) (1/8tsp) (1/8tsp)

Tues, Thurs, Sun – CSM+B (1/8tsp)

Food (slight pinch) flakes, pellets, freeze dried shrimp, frozen cube

On Friday add Garlic Xtreme, Selcon (vitamins)

Substrate, mixture of both South American Cichlid Sand and Eco-Complete

Substrate has never been shuffled or “fluffed” up since tank setup (2013)

Filter – 2 trays bio filtration (MarinePure balls) 2 trays sponges, 2 polishing pads

2 Koralia Nano 240 powerheads

Finnex FugeRay Planted+ Aquarium LED Light, and Current USA LED+


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[Fresh2o]

Might be a CO2 deficiency. I did not see a carbon source listed. Those plants are not very demanding light-wise and I believe the three fixtures may be providing too much light (for the amount of CO2 available).


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[tiger terror]

Might be a CO2 deficiency. I did not see a carbon source listed. Those plants are not very demanding light-wise and I believe the three fixtures may be providing too much light (for the amount of CO2 available).


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I agree with Fresh,got alot chems going into the tank as well...co2 defficientcy seems to be evident here.

20L Mafia

 

[Squatchmen]

I only have 2 fixtures, the Finnex and Current USA, but yeah, no Co2, I was doing excel until I overdosed a little when the plants were fine and looked good and then they went a little sour.

But I'll see if I can get my hands on a injection Co2 system or a cheaper version of that or even DIY it

And thanks tiger terror, I'll note to reduce the additives to my tank

 

[fishenthusiast]

If I were you, I'd reduce the lighting to get medium lighting. Do you know what the total PAR is for your tank? A CO2 system might not be necessary at that point. Liquid carbon would probably suffice.

 

[Mebbid]

Can we get a picture?

 

[Hooked on Fish]

Hi Squatchmen,

The gas bubbles suggest that your substrate has become toxic. The action of anaerobic bacteria is likely causing the production of Hydrogen Sulfide which will inhibit root growth (it won't do your fish any good either). With the large amounts of fertilizers and low CO2 you are definitely going to have algae problems. It might be time to redo your substrate. At a minimum try opening it up by poking it with a knife to get some oxygenated water down into the anaerobic layer.

Unless you are using CO2 injection then I'd recommend that you cut back on the fertilizers. You need to keep light, nutrient and CO2 in balance. If you don't want to use CO2 injection then you could try a siesta lighting schedule (5 hours on, 4 hours off, followed by 5 hours on again). The reason for this is simple, after about 4-5 hours the plants will have used all of the CO2 in the water column and stopped photosynthesizing. By turning the lights off for about 4 hours bacteria and fish expiration will have replenished the CO2 levels. From the plants point of view there is no point having the lights on if there is no CO2 in the water. This and a daily dose of EasyCarbo (Glutaraldehyde) seems to work well for me.

Hope this helps.

 

[tiger terror]

Hi Squatchmen,

The gas bubbles suggest that your substrate has become toxic. The action of anaerobic bacteria is likely causing the production of Hydrogen Sulfide which will inhibit root growth (it won't do your fish any good either). With the large amounts of fertilizers and low CO2 you are definitely going to have algae problems. It might be time to redo your substrate. At a minimum try opening it up by poking it with a knife to get some oxygenated water down into the anaerobic layer.

Unless you are using CO2 injection then I'd recommend that you cut back on the fertilizers. You need to keep light, nutrient and CO2 in balance. If you don't want to use CO2 injection then you could try a siesta lighting schedule (5 hours on, 4 hours off, followed by 5 hours on again). The reason for this is simple, after about 4-5 hours the plants will have used all of the CO2 in the water column and stopped photosynthesizing. By turning the lights off for about 4 hours bacteria and fish expiration will have replenished the CO2 levels. From the plants point of view there is no point having the lights on if there is no CO2 in the water. This and a daily dose of EasyCarbo (Glutaraldehyde) seems to work well for me.

Hope this helps.

Good points made&info given by HOF..not sure about the siesta period&the co2..

20L Mafia

 

[Sk3lly]

Hi Squatchmen,

The reason for this is simple, after about 4-5 hours the plants will have used all of the CO2 in the water column and stopped photosynthesizing. By turning the lights off for about 4 hours bacteria and fish expiration will have replenished the CO2 levels. From the plants point of view there is no point having the lights on if there is no CO2 in the water. This and a daily dose of EasyCarbo (Glutaraldehyde) seems to work well for me.

Hope this helps.

Complete RUBBISH!!! Laughable really....

So if fish and bacteria can replenish co2 levels in 4-5 hours on a siesta period, then why run co2 ever??

Surely the fish and bacteria will produce lots more co2 overnight ready for the first photoperiod???

The reason why this works well for you is because you dose liquid co2

The reason the OP is having problems is because of a lack of co2 (gas or liquid)


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[rkilling1]

Complete RUBBISH!!! Laughable really....

So if fish and bacteria can replenish co2 levels in 4-5 hours on a siesta period, then why run co2 ever??

Surely the fish and bacteria will produce lots more co2 overnight ready for the first photoperiod???

The reason why this works well for you is because you dose liquid co2

The reason the OP is having problems is because of a lack of co2 (gas or liquid)


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Not rubbish at all. It's a fact that the tank will replenish CO2 during a siesta period. This will NOT add more then the normal atmospheric amounts. So after a couple or hours, the CO2 will increase to around 3-4 ppm depending on how much surface agitation is occurring.

We inject CO2 to not only ensure the loss is replenished, we put more CO2 into the water column then can occur naturally.

 

[bcarl_10gal]

Regardless of the debate above, even if you raise the CO2 by 3-4ppm from 0 thats still not nearly enough for about 50PAR of light.

OP get some liquid CO2 (Metricide, Excel, etc) to start and cut back on the light intensity. In the meantime research pressurized CO2 systems especially if you want to add more light.

 

[Mebbid]

Hi Squatchmen,

The gas bubbles suggest that your substrate has become toxic. The action of anaerobic bacteria is likely causing the production of Hydrogen Sulfide which will inhibit root growth (it won't do your fish any good either). With the large amounts of fertilizers and low CO2 you are definitely going to have algae problems. It might be time to redo your substrate. At a minimum try opening it up by poking it with a knife to get some oxygenated water down into the anaerobic layer.

Do you have any reading material for this? I'd be interested in looking into that as I've never heard it before.

Unless you are using CO2 injection then I'd recommend that you cut back on the fertilizers. You need to keep light, nutrient and CO2 in balance. If you don't want to use CO2 injection then you could try a siesta lighting schedule (5 hours on, 4 hours off, followed by 5 hours on again). The reason for this is simple, after about 4-5 hours the plants will have used all of the CO2 in the water column and stopped photosynthesizing. By turning the lights off for about 4 hours bacteria and fish expiration will have replenished the CO2 levels. From the plants point of view there is no point having the lights on if there is no CO2 in the water. This and a daily dose of EasyCarbo (Glutaraldehyde) seems to work well for me.

Hope this helps.

I'm very skeptical of this statement. If this were true then people that run pressurized CO2 with a pH controller could run their lights 24/7 without any issues and that's really not the case.

 

[Sk3lly]

Not rubbish at all. It's a fact that the tank will replenish CO2 during a siesta period. This will NOT add more then the normal atmospheric amounts. So after a couple or hours, the CO2 will increase to around 3-4 ppm depending on how much surface agitation is occurring.

We inject CO2 to not only ensure the loss is replenished, we put more CO2 into the water column then can occur naturally.

Im not doubting co2 levels will rise in a siesta period.

The statement that was made about it bring replenished by fish and bacteria is rubbish!

Surface agitation is what keeps the co2 and o2 at a certain level.


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[rkilling1]

Im not doubting co2 levels will rise in a siesta period.

The statement that was made about it bring replenished by fish and bacteria is rubbish!

Surface agitation is what keeps the co2 and o2 at a certain level.


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I'm with you on that one. Though the bacteria and fish (Along with the plants) expel CO2, I would find it unlikely that it would be enough to replenish it back to atmospheric levels alone. This is, of course, without us testing how much those sources do contribute.

 

[Sk3lly]

I'm with you on that one. Though the bacteria and fish (Along with the plants) expel CO2, I would find it unlikely that it would be enough to replenish it back to atmospheric levels alone. This is, of course, without us testing how much those sources do contribute.

I would say its very negligible. As is the co2 plants respire after lights out.

There are loads of little processes like this happening in these tanks that contribute very little, yet are essential.


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[Hooked on Fish]

Ah good to see a some robust debate going on and a few challenges being thrown out there.

Firstly I'm getting my info from Dianna Walstad's "Ecology of the planted Aquarium". The chart below shows the results of a lighting experiment and it's affect on CO2 levels. After the lights are switched off for four hours the CO2 levels nearly completely recover to the pre-dawn levels. The author (not me) suggests that the rapid recovery is due to bacterial metabolism in the highly oxygenated water.

I'd like to mention here that I don't have anything against CO2 injection, I just prefer to use a low tech approach that is closer to nature (and cheaper). But while I'm getting satisfactory results it will never enable me to achieve the high growth rates that can be achieved with CO2 fertilization. It is also true that the growth I'm getting is being helped along by using Glutaraldehyde. I did perform an unintentional experiment when my lighting timer failed. By leaving the lights on for about 14 hours a day continuously over a week I noticed a definite increase in algal growth.

For Mebbid there's a section on Hydrogen Sulfide Toxicity that pretty much describes the original post.

Even if you are not interested in ever using a soil substrate it's still worth reading this book.

 

[Sk3lly]

In my opinion diana walstads methods and ways of thinking are useless in this thread unless the OP has this style setup

Does not change the FACT the OP needs a carbon source that is greater than the naturally occurring co2 in the water. The problems he/she has described with plants is obvious.

Diana walstad, bacteria and fish producing co2, its all NONSENSE!

Either lower your lighting levels or use pressurised/liquid carbon to supplement your plants


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[Hooked on Fish]

Hi Sk3lly,

That nonsense seems to work for me.

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/members/100168-albums14356-picture68895.jpg

Have you actually read the book?

I'm wondering how you explain the "Bubbles coming up from substrate"?

 

[Sk3lly]

Wow yea lovely tank, by far the best ive ever seen in all my life!!! So glad you posted a picture of it

Im also very happy that Diana walstads methods are working for you. This method does not interest me in the slightest. My understanding of her work is to create a self sustaining, no maintenance needed ecosystem, based on an ultra low tech method. The reason why i said this is nonsense is that the OP as far as im aware is not following this method.

Geez get over yourself. I have no interest in getting into a debate with you. Was simply trying to help the OP. Plenty of people on this planted section have seen in the past what my tank looks like. Healthy plants. No algae


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[Mebbid]

I kind of agree with sk3lly. In that dianas tanks are meant for a super specific type of setup.

I went with a walstad type setup for a while although i mever really gave it enough of a chance. Her book is still on my reading to do list, i just havent had a chance for ut.

I don't think all her principles really apply to a tank thats not set up for it.