New Planted tank issues and Questions - Long post

[Minze]

First, this is long and I apologize. I wanted to give as much information as possible to try and figure this out. Here is the story leading up to where I am now

I had a 10 gallon tank that I kept my African Clawed Frog in (I also have a 40 gallon tropical tank and have been keeping tropical fish for 20 plus years). The frog was fully grown and I figured he would be happier with some more room to swim around in. At the same time I wanted to test my hand at planted tanks. So the first week of December I set up a 20 gallon long tank. I decided to go low light with a fluorite substrate. I have the stock lighting in the tank, a 20W fluorescent light (1 watt per gallon). I started the tank with the water from the 10 gallon tank topping it off with dechlorinated water. I have 3 tabs of Seachem Flourish in the substrate.

After some research I purchased Java Fern, Hornwort and (after some discussion with the guy at the fish store) Ludwigia Repens. Now, the Java Fern seems to be doing OK, not great. It’s not dieing, but not growing much either. I did end up having it reproduce from the tip of one of the leaves. The Hornwort seems to be doing poorly. I have 3 long (around 30 inches) strands of the plants (I have 1 floating at the top and 2 tucked into the substrate to see if there would be any difference in success with the plants). I also have a few smaller strands as well (floating). While the longer strands seem to have new growth at the ends, it seems to be growing slow. At the same time, at the opposite end of where the new growth is the plant seems to be dieing. It’s turning brown and the needles are falling off. This is happening to both floating and substrate hornwort. The Ludwigia seems to be doing the best. In transport to my house one of the branches broke in half. I planted both branches separately to see if it either would survive. Both did and on all of the stalks (8 of them) I have at least 1.5 inches of new growth in the past month and nice roots growing into the substrate. It also has kept its red in the leaves (at least so far) which I was told it would lose since I am low light.

I have been battling my PH in the new tank. It keeps dropping lower and lower. I have had to make frequent water changes (every 2-3 days) to keep the PH around the 6.8 – 7.0 range. If I let it go a full week the PH will drop down to close to 6.

Nitrite and Ammonia are 0. I can’t test the nitrate as I dropped the test tube shattering it and am waiting for a replacement kit to arrive. The tube for the Nitrate test was different than all the others that I have and I can’t find the directions from the kit to tell me how much water I should use for testing purposes.

My frog died last week after only taking food 2 times the week before that. Now with the frog gone, I have noticed snails in the tank. It seems I have 3 different types as I have noticed 3 different shaped shells on the snails. I also have what appear to be very tiny living things on the tank. If I had to guess I would say they are infant snails. They look like extremely tiny slugs and I can see them on the glass.

I am thinking the frog may have stopped taking food from me because he was eating snails. I only saw them in the tank after he was gone. This may have also been the contributing factor to his death. What does anyone else think?

Anyone have any ideas on why the PH would be dropping so rapidly?
Are the things I see on the glass baby snails without shells?
Anyone have any idea on why the hornwort would be doing so poorly when it should be a fast growing plant?
Should I trim the plant to separate the green portion from the brown portion?
Will the brown portion recover or should I toss it?
I have some white hair like bunches on my hornwort and it seems to be attaching itself to different things on the tank. Could this be hair algae? Should it be white? How can I get rid of it?

I was thinking of getting some yoyo loaches to control the snail population, but I want to get the tank stabilized before I add any livestock. Any ideas, suggestion or comments would be greatly appreciated!

 

[malkore]

1. Anyone have any ideas on why the PH would be dropping so rapidly?
Presence of an acid compound, or lack of alkalinity. You need to test you Kh (carbonate hardness) and tell us the reading in ppm, mg/l or degrees.

2. Are the things I see on the glass baby snails without shells?
sounds like planaria

3. Anyone have any idea on why the hornwort would be doing so poorly when it should be a fast growing plant?
hard to say. your low pH could be starving it of calcium, a trace nutrient which is rather necessary

4. Should I trim the plant to separate the green portion from the brown portion?
you can if you want. it won't hurt.

5. Will the brown portion recover or should I toss it?
toss it

6. I have some white hair like bunches on my hornwort and it seems to be attaching itself to different things on the tank. Could this be hair algae? Should it be white? How can I get rid of it?
only thing that was 'white' was a fungus that tends to form with DIY co2, or on driftwood. Is it thin and snot-like in consistency?

My yoyo's never proved to be big snail eaters.

 

[Minze]

Thanks for the help, the Kh is 53.7 ppm and the GH is 125.3 ppm.

Looking up Planaria seems like it may ne the case. Even though I was pulling the food out when the frog wouldn't eat, I'm sure there was some uneaten left around.

For the hair like bunches, it's definitely more hair like, not snot like. It looks almost like the old white fiber that I used in the corner filters years ago.

Hmm, for the yoyo's, I saw that cloen loaches were snail eaters. I know they can outgrow a 20 gallon. I have the toption of keeping them in the 20 gallon for a period then moving them to the 40 gallon when they grow.

 

[yeldarb]

Regarding the clown loaches, I have had two of them at different times in a 21 gal tank. Neither of them ever got large enough to necessitate the need to move them to a larger tank. Each was over two years old and they were about 2" long.

And yes... they did take care of the snails.

 

[Minze]

Thanks, that's good to know. Clown Loaches it is. I've always liked those the look of them but always had different types of catfish as my bottom dwellers.

 

[JohnnyRocket]

The pH might be dropping if there is a lot of rotting plant matter in your tank. When organic material rots, it turns acidic. Also, if you have driftwood, certain rocks, and coral either in your tank or in your filter, it could lower the pH. A good thing to know is your tap water pH, just to make sure that it isn't influencing your acidity.

Hornwort usually is a very fast growing plant. It is also a low light plant, which I'm guessing you know. I had a 29 gallon tank that had not completely cycled yet and the hornwort was growing a visible amount each day, about 6 inches a week, no exaggerations. Also, in my experience, Hornwort doesn't mind a pH around 6 or so; it is doing fine in my tetra tank that I keep at 6.2. Part of the way I keep the tank acidic is by not taking out the rotting plant matter. Consider this if your going for a slightly acidic pH, as to avoid buffers, but remove it if you are avoiding acidity.

I know you can't check for your nitrates, but they are very important when it comes to plants. High nitrates could contribute to hair algae, which it sounds like you've got some.

I would suggest adding fish to your tank now, even if its cheap gold fish. Here's why - plants "eat" nitrates and ammonia, both of which are byproducts of fish (ammonia directly, nitrates indirectly). They also "breathe" carbon dioxide (CO2) which, as you probably know, fish release. As you can see, plants will be much healthier if fish are present. But the beneficial relationship doesn't stop there. The fish are also greatly benefited by the presence of plants. The fishs' waist, ammonia, is harmful to themselves, and the plants remove it from the water, which I've described above. The water is also oxygenated by the plants (you can see this; its called pearling) and, of coarse, the fish use this oxygen. If you don't add fish, your plants will not have all the nutrients they need, unless you add them. However, even if you do add fish, you still may need to add nitrates to the water, which I've had to do in the past.

Regarding the snails, the only reason you should wage war against them is if you don't like the way they look, which is understandable. I have small snails in my planted tank, but I actually like them, as they don't harm the plants, other than eating an insignificant amount of the leaves. They can take care of algae to a point, and can provide food to some inhabitants. It makes it more of a little ecosystem with them present, in my mind.

I hope that I've helped, even if only slightly. Sorry for the length, I got carried away!

 

[Minze]

Thanks for the reply!

until this weekend I was just doing water changes and not vacuuming the gravel. I vac'd the gravel and did pull up a good deal of the needles from the hornwort that had fallen off. I'll see in a day or two if the removal had any affect on the PH swings.

For the Hornwort, I am definitely not getting the type of growth you are. I am getting more growth from the Ludwigia Repens than the hornwort. The Java fern also seems to be just living. Other than the growth of the new plant on the leaf tip, there seems to be no growth on it. I'm not sure if it is stagnating because it is growing the new plant or not. I'm not sure what kind of growth I should be expecting from that.

For the nitrates, I do know that my tap water comes with about 20 ppm of nitrates naturally. The ph of my tap water hovers in the neutral range.

As for the snails, the only concern I have is that I think my African Clawed Frog may have eaten one contributing to it's demise. It's just a theory. There is definitely something amiss with the planaria and ph shifts going crazy. I intend on getting a replacement ACF in the future and am concerned that it may take in a snail as well. I have always tried to keep tanks as natural as possible in the past and snails wouldn't bother me as long as they were in check.