What am i doing wrong???

[11panos04]

Sorry in advance for any language mistakes,as English is not my 1st language.
I have a 35lt aquarium(45cm x 26cm x 31cm) running for 2,5 months, with a betta fish and a couple of ottos. I noticed that my plants have problems,not growing and leaves decay. Plants are hygrophila difformis,siamensis, sessiflora and some small flowting(don t remember the name).Substrate is a normal,plain brown quartz sand. I change about 50% of water every week,and add sera aquatan and another to turn the water tea color. I dose every day tropica s specialized nutrition and seachem flourish all in correct dosages written on the bottles. It has a glass cover,as my betta jumped out once. The light is a fishguard led 439mm(unfortunately I don t know how many lumens,it doesn t say on the lamp or on the box.Ιt s on a timer 7 hours every day.It has 24 white and 6 leds.Water tests are normal.What could i possibly be doing wrong?

 

[Aiken Drum]

Those plants are all low demand plants and shouldnt need much in the way of specialist attention.

Whats probably called plant melt and will normally happen when a plant transitions from emersed growth to submerged. Aquarium plants are cultivated partially under water where they have ready access to CO2 from the atmosphere. You plant them in your aquarium where this CO2 is cut off and the leaf structure isnt suited to its new environment and will die off or melt.

New growth will be more tolerant to being submerged. Its possible you will lose all your original plant growth to melt, but new growth should start to come through before the plant dies completely.

Are you seeing any new growth?

How long are you giving the plants to establish? Plants transitioning can take months before they are fully healthy submerged growth. Remove dead and dying leaves so the plant can concentrate its resources on producing new growth rather than supporting dying growth.

Also not all plants will work in every tank. Keep the plants that thrive. Remove ones that just won't establish.

 

[11panos04]

I ve been havin them since november 8.I see some growth,cannot deny it,but only on sessiflora.Difformis and anubias seem to have stopped.As for siamensis,i don t think they grow at all,they just melt...I ll try to find a lamp perhaps suited for my tank and these plants.I tried testing the lamp with a luxometer app on my phone,it read almost 2000 lux.I don t trust much those apps,but,even if the half is true,it is too much...Some told me that tropica s nutrition spec. melts the plants,others that flourish does that...I don t know what to do...The first time this happened to me was 4 years ago,before joining the military, and i got so much displeasure from that,that i abandoned it.I don t want this to happen for 2nd time...

 

[Aiken Drum]

Lux is almost completely irrelevant. It doesnt tell you anything about how useful the light is for growing plants, just how strong it appears to the human eye. The lux meter on my phone is pretty good. I have a lux meter for my job and the one on my phone compares pretty good, but its irrelevant for growing plants. Par is a much better measure, but par meters are expensive.

The plants you have will grow under pretty much any lighting, you dont need strong light. Better light will help, but its not needed. How long are your lights on for?

Anubias is very slow growing so dont expect to see much growth in such a short space of time.

I would actually stop dosing fertiliser until the plants settle in. Growing plants in water is a trial and error situation. You need to change things gradually. Give it a few months to see what affect your change has had. Tweak a little more. Wait and observe. Etc etc.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Assuming a light is made for a freshwater aquarium you should be aiming for 10 to 20 lumens per litre of water for low demand plants like you have. You tank is 35 litre so a 350 to 700 lumen light (or combination of lights) would be more than sufficient. If its an aquarium light it should have appropriate colour spectrum suitable for growing lights.

Pretty much any aquarium light sized for the tank should suffice for growing these plants.

 

[11panos04]

Lux is almost completely irrelevant. It doesnt tell you anything about how useful the light is for growing plants, just how strong it appears to the human eye. The lux meter on my phone is pretty good. I have a lux meter for my job and the one on my phone compares pretty good, but its irrelevant for growing plants. Par is a much better measure, but par meters are expensive.

The plants you have will grow under pretty much any lighting, you dont need strong light. Better light will help, but its not needed. How long are your lights on for?

Anubias is very slow growing so dont expect to see much growth in such a short space of time.

I would actually stop dosing fertiliser until the plants settle in. Growing plants in water is a trial and error situation. You need to change things gradually. Give it a few months to see what affect your change has had. Tweak a little more. Wait and observe. Etc etc.

Lights turn on 7 hours every day.I put a shadowing filter on the lamp.Can you post a link bout par and leds so that i can read it???I have a lot to learn, obviously.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Is it just a desk light or something? Im sorry, i dont know what a shadowing filter is. Is it reducing the light output?

I dont really want to get into par. Its over complicating things. The plants you have dont need that kind of investigation and you have no way of measuring par anyway. I was just mentioning par because unlike lux its a measure of how useful light is for growing plants whereas lux is just a measure of how strong a light is regardless of whether a plant can use that light.

LEDs are just a different light output to traditional lamps. They just use less energy and dont need replacing as often. An aquarium light over your tank will be sufficient to grow these. If its 10 to 20 lumens per litre all the better.

 

[11panos04]

Is it just a desk light or something? Im sorry, i dont know what a shadowing filter is. Is it reducing the light output?

I dont really want to get into par. Its over complicating things. The plants you have dont need that kind of investigation and you have no way of measuring par anyway. I was just mentioning par because unlike lux its a measure of how useful light is for growing plants whereas lux is just a measure of how strong a light is regardless of whether a plant can use that light.

LEDs are just a different light output to traditional lamps. They just use less energy and dont need replacing as often. An aquarium light over your tank will be sufficient to grow these. If its 10 to 20 lumens per litre all the better.

Thats it https://www.amazon.in/Foodie-Puppies-Fishguard-White-Blue-Appearance/dp/B07PQB64SF

 

[Aiken Drum]

Ive found that light on several websites, cant find a value for lumens.

Its a cheap light fitting, but it should be good for growing low demand plants. I keep saying some of these low demand aquatic plants i can keep alive in a bucket of water in the shed. Will they do better with a better light? Of course they will. If you want to buy a better light, as i said look for something with 350 to 700 lumens output.

 

[11panos04]

This is from the top.I put the lamp diagonally,as my only choices for putting the filter were either on the one or the other side,and so the lamp's plastic ''feet'' cannot stand if put horizontally.Do you thing it is problem to the lighting?

 

[Aiken Drum]

I cant see anything wrong with having the light corner to corner like that. It might make the light look a bit uneven in the tank. I mean, its more usual to have the hang on back filter on the back of the tank with the light running side to side. But technically there is no reason why you cant set it up like that.

Is this a tank that was bought as a kit? Tank, filter, lights, heater in a package or something you have put together with individual bits of equipment bought separately? Did you have to cut the side of the lid off to get the filter on the side like that?

 

[11panos04]

I cant see anything wrong with having the light corner to corner like that. It might make the light look a bit uneven in the tank. I mean, its more usual to have the hang on back filter on the back of the tank with the light running side to side. But technically there is no reason why you cant set it up like that.

Is this a tank that was bought as a kit? Tank, filter, lights, heater in a package or something you have put together with individual bits of equipment bought separately? Did you have to cut the side of the lid off to get the filter on the side like that?

I ordered everything,it was not premade.The lid was cut last,as i wanted to place the filter first and check how it should be cut.The filter is 370l/h so i thought it would be sufficient to cycle the water from the other end of the tank.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Glass lids usually have a strip of plastic along the back that can be cut out for filter input/output cables etc and the filter sits at the back. If you are happy with your set up its fine.

 

[11panos04]

The slightly brownish tint on the stem plants i think is brown algae.Do i continue dosing of fertilisers normally?

 

[Aiken Drum]

Manually clean off brown algae. It is common in newly set up tanks and usually goes away on its own given time. We had a thread about brown algae/diatoms recently. Check it out.

https://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f12/brown-algae-378761.html

I would say that brown algae feeds of silicates, so if you arent seeing it on your substrate and glass too, its unlikely to be brown algae. If its wiping off then its algae of some kind. Algae would suggest too much light and/or nutrients. Increasing light will help with brown algae as it promotes green algae which outcompetes the brown algae for nutrients.

 

[11panos04]

I don t see any silicates,to be honest.I ll read the thread,but i wouldn t wanna grow green algae to outcompete brown algae.I mean,growing another kind of algae to kill brown algae...i ll end up with algae again

 

[Aiken Drum]

You cant see silicates, its presence causes diatoms/brown algae.

You will always have some algae in the tank. What you are trying to do is find a lighting period through trial and error where your plant growth is balanced with the amount of work you are happy doing to clean up algae. This is normally 6 to 8 hours a day of an appropriate sized light. If you dont want algae, remove the plants, turn off the lights and only turn them on for a few hours a day.

Im going to front up here and let you know im also following your discussion on fishlore.

Thread 'What am I doing wrong with plants?' https://www.fishlore.com/aquariumfishforum/threads/what-am-i-doing-wrong-with-plants.516157/

Improving lights/increasing photo period as is being suggested on there will obviously improve your plant growth. It will also help to deal with brown algae if thats what it is. It will definitely increase other types of algae. Its finding that balance that you personally are happy with.

 

[Aiken Drum]

What you are trying to do is provide the right amount of nutrients and the right amount of light of light for your plants. Too much of either and you get algae. Not enough and your plant growth will be slow. The only real way to do this is trial and error and judge it over extended periods of time.

Your plants are low demand. They dont need much of either. You can increase light and this will enable it to take up more nutrients, but your plants are low demand on nutrients so the algae will take advantage of whatever nutrients your plants cant take up. Same with adding more nutrients. Your plants can only take up so much nutrient, even with a stronger light.

 

[11panos04]

Would you suggest that i add more plants?To my conception,if i put it right,in my mind,i wanted to build a tank to look natural enough to a river stream or a river bank,with few plants.Thats why i glued those dried pear tree branches(i found on the net that it is safe for aquarium) on the lid too,to seem as if there s a tree close to the river which branches touch the water.

Ps.So far,i have got bought plants from stores as well as cuts from aquarists.Why always,and i mean always,the plants from aquarists are in a much better shape than the story bought ones?

 

[Aiken Drum]

I think your tank is heavily planted as it is. When those plants establish your tank will be full.

Honestly, i think what you are being told on both your threads is your light is fine, maybe just try adjusting the lighting period, cut down on the ferts you are dosing into the water, this might help with the algae, and give it some time for the plants to adjust to being in an aquarium environment.

Im going to throw something into the mix now you are mentioning algae that might help. Seachem Excel. Its a mild algaecide that will help clean the leaves to assist take up of CO2. Its commonly refered to as liquid CO2 even though it doesn't add any CO2 to the tank. Maybe add some root tabs into the substrate around any rooted plants.

I just noticed you are keeping otos. What are they eating?