Whats Up With My Plants?

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justsomedude89

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Jul 15, 2008
Messages
89
Location
Joppa, Maryland
lately my plants have been deminishing for lack of a better term... they have started to brown and become see-through. any1 have any ideas?

29 Gallon
Eco-Complete Substrate
48 Watts of T5 HO
20 Watts of stock tube lighting
Stock list in Sig

Crappy pics of plants for an idea.

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It's a deficiency. I suspect you're not supplementing fertilizers? You could consider it, or consider adding plant tabs below the swords, that would help them out.
 
what should i do about fertilizing? i havnt really read up on that to be honest. its not just the swords btw my water sprite and hygro is browning as well if that helps at all
 
How long do you have the lights on per day?
In the mean time till you figure out what you want to do about ferts you should reduce the time the lights are on and possibly raise them slightly.

Lights are what drive plants, the more light the more nutrients/CO2 they demand/need. So for the short term reducing the lighting will reduce there need for ferts.

Just keep in mind there are many different yet similar fert schedules, many methods like "EI" are based on CO2 injected tanks which grow plants much faster.
 
Leaves that are pale or yellow usually signals an iron deficiency. Yellow leaves can also (more rarely) signal a nitrate deficiency. Pinholes in (otherwise healthy/green) leaves usually signals a potassium deficiency.

It looks to me like your iron and potassium, and possibly your nitrate, levels are all too low.

If your tank is relatively small, and you want to take the most convenient (though more expensive) path, you can buy all the ferts you need in liquid form made by Seachem, which sells various solutions in 100 ml and 250 ml bottles. You might want to consider first trying a regular (twice a week) dosing of Seachem Flourish, which has iron and potassium in it, as well as a bunch of other nutrients. If you do that for a month or so and don't see enough results, then you may have to dose more strongly with the specific two nutrients you need in concentrated form, using Flourish Iron and Flourish Potassium.

If you have a very large tank, or you would simply rather take the cheaper option (though one that is more work), you can buy fertilizers in bulk in solid (powder) form that you have to weigh out using a very small scale and mix your own solutions. The source of these that has been most recommended to me is Rex Grigg. I've never ordered from that site myself so I can't say much more about them.

As for nitrates, presuming you have a decent number of fish in the tank, the best way to raise nitrate levels is to do water changes less often! General suggested ranges for nitrates in a planted tank range from 5-30 ppm, depending upon how heavily your tank is planted and how high your light level is. Very high light with lots of plants and CO2, you want closer to 30 ppm nitrates. Lower light, no CO2, maybe aim for 10 ppm.

I'm far from an expert when it comes to planted tanks, so perhaps others will jump in here with more advice.
 
I'd start by checking your Nitrate levels. If it measures under 20ppm and you haven't calibrated your test kit, then you could have closer to 0ppm. Unless you want to calibrate your test kit I'd recommend aiming for at least 20ppm so that you know for sure that you have that amount in the aquarium. If your Nitrate levels are good, I'd probably just pick up Flourish "Comprehensive" to dose your micros and some NoSalt (KCl) from the grocery store to dose Potassium. If you're Nitrate levels are low, then I'd pick up the combo pack from Rex Grigg that JohnPaul recommended. Since shipping is the most expensive part of dry ferts, it's better to order everything at once. For Potassium you want to dose 10-20ppm per week, and for Flourish Comprehensive you want to dose 0.1-0.2ppm iron per week. These could be a single dose or split into several smaller doses. All of these are just starting numbers and can be adjusted as need based on the health of your plants. Give any change at least 2 weeks to see the results before making further changes.
 
thanks guys. i checked out my nitrate and they have deff bottomed out to 0 so im goin to pick up the combo pack and use less light for now
 
If your Nitrate levels are good, I'd probably just pick up Flourish "Comprehensive" to dose your micros and some NoSalt (KCl) from the grocery store to dose Potassium.

Joy,

Is "Flourish Comprehensive" the same as (regular, plain) "Flourish"--the one I linked a few posts above? Or is it something else?
 
Joy,

Is "Flourish Comprehensive" the same as (regular, plain) "Flourish"--the one I linked a few posts above? Or is it something else?

Yes it is. If you look closely at the label you'll see Comprehensive under Flourish. I like to specify Flourish "Comprehensive" so to help avoid confusion with Flourish Trace, which isn't nearly as good of a micro fert.
 
Yes it is. If you look closely at the label you'll see Comprehensive under Flourish. I like to specify Flourish "Comprehensive" so to help avoid confusion with Flourish Trace, which isn't nearly as good of a micro fert.

Gotcha. Thanks. :D
 
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