My anubias dissappeared :(

[KreativJustin]

Hello everyone, I got an Anubias from the petstore over the weekend. It was actually kind of weak once I got it home, and a leaf for 2 fell off. I believe they had the rhizome too far down in the gel stuff, but I could be wrong. Either way, each night a leaf has disappeared. I chalked it up to it being weak, and maybe the current just finally carried them away. However, I had 2 short leaves on there that seemed like they would hold up, and each night 1 disappeared. The one had a little damage on the top, making me think someone attacked it.. but what would?

The rhizome is still there chilling on the bottom with the roots, no damage to that, just missing all of the leaves.

I have this stock.

8 danios (zebra + mixed)
3 rummy nose tetra
5 bloodfin tetra
5 fire tretra
2 clown pleco
1 gold spotted pleco
1 black racer nerite snail
2 otocinclus

I believe that is it ^.

I've had the danios, oto's, and 2 clown plecos in a planted tank before without any damage to the plants..

I do also have frogbit in there that the swimmers love to play in, but they do zero damage to the frogbit.

I want to do planted, but I definitely do not want to spend more money on another anubias if it is going to get slaughtered each night lol.

[Aiken Drum]

Commercially grown plants are often cultivated “emersed” rather than “submerged”. This way the plants can easily get their carbon requirement from atmospheric CO2. They can be grown quicker which makes the operation much more commercially viable. You take that plant, put it in your aquarium, cut off its source of CO2 and the plant goes into survival mode. It starts to use up its stored carbon and the leafs melt. You may lose all your original growth to melt but new leafs will have a structure more suited to its new environment and get its carbon from the water. Plant melt is a normal stage in aquarium plant growth. To judge the health of a plant look for new growth rather than what might be happening to the original growth, and judge it over extended periods of time.

[KreativJustin]

Originally Posted by Aiken Drum

Commercially grown plants are often cultivated “emersed” rather than “submerged”. This way the plants can easily get their carbon requirement from atmospheric CO2. They can be grown quicker which makes the operation much more commercially viable. You take that plant, put it in your aquarium, cut off its source of CO2 and the plant goes into survival mode. It starts to use up its stored carbon and the leafs melt. You may lose all your original growth to melt but new leafs will have a structure more suited to its new environment and get its carbon from the water. Plant melt is a normal stage in aquarium plant growth. To judge the health of a plant look for new growth rather than what might be happening to the original growth, and judge it over extended periods of time.

I was planning on leaving the rhizome in there and see if it would grow anything new. Why does this happen at night though?

[Aiken Drum]

Originally Posted by KreativJustin

I was planning on leaving the rhizome in there and see if it would grow anything new. Why does this happen at night though?

No idea. Could conceivably be the pleco browsing for algae at night, and the leafs already being weakened are being knocked off.

But there is nothing in your tank that could destroy a healthy anubias. They are very hardy plants, as tough as they come. Ive only ever had 1 thing eat an anubias, and that is a 3" diameter apple snail and it will eat anything put in the tank.

[KreativJustin]

Originally Posted by Aiken Drum

No idea. Could conceivably be the pleco browsing for algae at night, and the leafs already being weakened are being knocked off.

But there is nothing in your tank that could destroy a healthy anubias. They are very hardy plants, as tough as they come. Ive only ever had 1 thing eat an anubias, and that is a 3" diameter apple snail and it will eat anything put in the tank.

Ok, that makes sense. That is literally what I was thinking about with the pleco(s) this morning... that they might be too strong for the weakness of the stem. The first time I had these plants, I bought them kinda large, and the stems were strong, this one was/is very small.

[Aiken Drum]

Just an FYI. Ive moved an anubias from 1 tank to another to save it from the apple snail. It was pretty beat up, hardly any leafs. Its grown back 1 leaf about every month. 6 months on its just about where it was when i bought it. Dont expect overnight improvement.

[KreativJustin]

Originally Posted by Aiken Drum

Just an FYI. Ive moved an anubias from 1 tank to another to save it from the apple snail. It was pretty beat up, hardly any leafs. Its grown back 1 leaf about every month. 6 months on its just about where it was when i bought it. Dont expect overnight improvement.

Yeah, they are def slow growers.. thank you for the reminder.

[Colin_T]

Originally Posted by KreativJustin

I have this stock.

8 danios (zebra + mixed)
3 rummy nose tetra
5 bloodfin tetra
5 fire tretra
2 clown pleco
1 gold spotted pleco
1 black racer nerite snail
2 otocinclus

Suckermouth catfish and snails eat plants when they are hungry. Are you adding any algae wafers, cucumber or algae to the tank for these fish and the snail?
If not, they might have chomped the new plant.

Plants that are tissue cultured and still in a plastic container with a lid, usually have soft leaves and soft new leaves are more readily eaten than tougher older leaves.

[KreativJustin]

Usually I feed them 2 every evening. The plecos love em, the Molly seems to enjoy them too.. The snail was added the same day as the anubias. I did forget to mention that I have a Molly. My wife did say that the leaves were tore up, not just "fell off".

[Colin_T]

My guess is someone enjoyed the salad you provided to them

You can offer the fish slices of pumpkin, zucchini, cucumber and various green leafy vegetables. Just make sure they are free of chemicals and give them a good rinse under tap water before putting in the tank. Some fish are happy eating them raw others prefer them blanched (partly cooked). Try both ways and see which type they prefer.

Don't feed them any potatoes or onions, or onion relatives (spring onions, shallots, etc).

If the plant matter floats, stick a fork in it and let it sink.

Remove uneaten food after a few hours so it doesn't pollute the water. Offer it to them each day or every couple of days.

Most catfish are nocturnal and prefer to be fed after dark. If your fish come out during the day and eat, that is fine and you can keep feeding them in the morning.

[KreativJustin]

Cool I'll grab them some veggies next time I hit up the grocery.

Knowing this, should I not put in an amazon sword, or should I be fine in adding more plants?

[Colin_T]

Add plants any time you like but try to add some fruit/ veges to reduce the chance of new plants getting eaten.