Whats up with my plants?

[lostintheforest]

Hello all,
Just hoping to get some advice on plant care. I've noticed gradually over the past few weeks my Xmas moss has started turning darker with some parts tuning brownish. I also have cabomba as well and although it is growing like crazy it is looking a lot less green and more brown/yellow. What could be causing this. I also noticed some fine green hair like threads coming off the cabomba leaves themselves (see photos) I'm not sure if it is a water quality issue, nutrient difficiency/over abundance or a lighting issue (or some combo). Water has 0 nitrites and ammonia and around 40ppm nitrates. So far I've been using the standard led lights that come with the fluval edge 6 gallon nano tank and have also added. 12 inch led strip which puts off 250 lumens @ 6500K. I also am dosing the tank w around .5 ml of flourish weekly.
Any ideas what I'm doin wrong/ how to make the plants look a little healthier?
Thanks in advance for any replies!!

 

[adeebm]

Cabomba is a fast growing plant and usually benefits from good lighting and ferts. Which flourish products are you using?

--Adeeb

 

[lostintheforest]

Cabomba is a fast growing plant and usually benefits from good lighting and ferts. Which flourish products are you using?

--Adeeb

So far I'm just using regular seachem flourish. I've order some excel as well but it won't get here until next week. Do you think my lighting is not adequate? Any idea why the moss would look dull?
If you look at the photo, the miss on the bottom right is brand new added yesterday. While the moss on the driftwood I've had for about a month now. See how the older moss is more brown looking? On the other hand the older moss does have green shoots of fresh growth on all the tips. I'm just not sure what could be causing the discoloration.

 

[lostintheforest]

Anyone else have any ideas what might by causing my moss and other plants to turn brown? This is what it looks like today and about a month ago

 

[aqua_chem]

What's your nitrates at?

 

[TotallyCoral]

Whenever I stir up the floramax, my java moss and other plants always attracts little dirt particles on them, making them seem brown. So I always have to siphon it out. Is that possible with your substrate? Also, when I kept java moss in my edge the stock halogen lighting completely fried the plant to brown and burnt (although it looks like you're using leds) so that shouldn't be the case.

 

[lostintheforest]

Nitrates are around 40ppm. I will be doing a 30-40% water change when I get home from work to try and reduce that, although when I told the guy at lfs he said that 40 wasn't too high.

It's possible the browning has to do with particles settling on the moss itself, and I had wondered if maybe it was diatoms or something that was coating my cabomba and miss making them both appear more brown, but I've noticed the bright green growth spots at the ends of the moss have also turned a darker color and don't seem to look like they're growing very much any more. I've also noticed thin hair like filaments growing off of my cabomba which I'm very worried about. I want to provide the best environment for my plants and animals so any advice on what I should do to remedy the situation would be greatly appreciated.
I also just received some flourish excel in the mail today and will dose the tank after I do the water change tonight.