pixie lillies losing leaves and microsword doing the same

hey guys so i have pixie lillies and microsword in my nano competition tank and the pixie lilly plants are losing leaves but the stems are rotting about midway up and the microsword also seems to be melting i'm not sure why though. i fertilize 1ml of sera florena once a day everyday except sat and sunday and 0,1ml excel every once a week. water changes are done once a week before i leave on a friday. i alos see very little new growth on the swords. lighting is bright indirect light from a window pretty much all day.

any one know whats what? should i change ferts?

 

I think changing ferts might be a good idea. Perhaps look at Seachems range. Flourish, Flourish Iron, Flourish Potassium, etc... I'm not sure, but it sounds like a deficiency of some kind. Sera make good products, but the Seachem range is hard to beat at the moment.

But the fact that the microswords are melting, leads me to believe it could be lack of lighting. You say you are only getting indirect light in the tank? Perhaps some direct light might help? I know indirect is fine for plants growing emmersed, but I'm pretty sure immersed plants will struggle.

 

You might want to look at adding C02 as even with good lighting and fertilizer, your plants may not be photosynthesizing to their potential......doing this change my tank rapidly, stopped melting and slow growth in just two weeks

 

She can't add Co2. It's the competition tank, and No Co2 is the only rule.

 

Wow ok......why do they not allow C02 but they do allow ferts. I'm just interested to know as one day I would like to enter a competition

 

Because it's the point of the competition. The Prize is a Co2 kit for a nano tank.

 

Duh.....Daily fert dosing leaves LOTSA nutrients,but only dosing excell once a week is way to little bio available carbon for the plants to use all these nutrients.... Given,I have never used the Sera roduct you mention,but if its formulation is anything like Seachem Flourish,your lants are suffering from nutrient burn...
Excell only stays available to plants for 24 hours...
Switch to Seachem Flourish Complete on a weekly dose and Excell every day or at worst,every 2nd day - you'll see the differance in a week...

 

Ok got it. Can water chemistry also create plant melt? I've had it before in another tank and eventually the swords recovered without me changing the lighting? The only thing I remember switching was the tap water conditioner that I used

 

But @azurekoi the bottle says to dose 5ml once a week so i've split the dosing into 1ml increments will that still cause fertilizer burn? i started dosing 0,1ml excel everyday but got worried i might get a build up and poison my fish so i eased up. oy looks like another trip to petstop tomorrow. i think Didi is getting tired of seeing me lol i was there twice last week.

@Sean J i'm not sure its the lighting, my tank is right at the window it actually backs on to it so the lighting is quite bright just no direct sunlight i guess i shoulda said. sorry been studying all day so i'm a wee bit brain ded lol. i have incredibly growth on my anubias nana, i'm seeing a new leaf on each plant nearly every week and the crypts are sending out new leaves as well i would have thought theyed be the first to do the melting thing

 

Hmmm.. Where did your Micro Sword come from? What tank was it in? Was it in a high tech tank with Co2 and high light?

I also tend to agree with @azurekoi as well... If you are adding ferts, and you are limited with Co2 and Lighting, then the plants will not be using as much ferts as they should be. So you will get side effects. But one telling thing is that Algae will be a big part of this equation. Are you having algae blooms at all? That is one of the first signs of imbalance.

Also, the crypts and Anubias are low light plants. The fact that they are flourishing, leads me to believe it is lighting issues, and not water quality issues.

 

@Sean J nope no algae blooms, but then again Gary could be keeping that under control. i had Bacopa in there before but i threw it out when i did the new design, it flowered once which was pretty wicked. ok so i attached an old pic that'll show the tank position and lighting. its under my bedside lamp as well until i go to bed at around 12ish so it gets a lot of light. oh and the microsword came from petstop so nope no high tech setup or anything its been in about 2 weeks now

 

Ok, the microsword was probably grown emmersed, and is adapting to underwater conditions. So it is normal for them to lose some leaves when first introduced. Adding Co2 to the tank would help smooth the transition.

Now, isn't it normal for Lilies to lose some leaves? They lose their leaves to make room for more leaves, or am I getting this wrong? Did the actual leaves turn a little brown before the stems started melting?

 

Also consider the change of angle of the sun from winter to summer - in winter you will actualy get more light as the angle of the sun is lower in the sky than in summer - could be a light issue as Sean suggests...Rather dose the ferts in one go - the plants use it as they need it - splitting it up makes no real differance...

 

i'm not sure i've never grown pixies before. the thing that gets me is that the leaves arnt browning or anything but they dont rot at the base but in the middle of the stem. mind you the surface leafs stem i've had for the last 2 weeks is starting to rot so maybe it is old leaves. well i'll up my excel dose then and go get some seachem ferts and then see.

@azurekoi maybe hmmm i'll check out lights while im at petstop tomorrow then. one of those clip on LEDs should be ok right? would the light periodmake a difference, it gets about 16hrs of light about 10 of that is from the window and the rest is from my bedside lamp. ok cool thanks i'll dose once a week it'll make things much easier and just do the excel daily

 

My concern is that it is not direct light... Try it in direct light and see how much difference it makes before you spend money on a light. Stick your bedside lamp directly over it for a few days and see if things change.

 

@windfire - clear your PM box girl - got some lighting info I want to send you....lol

 

@azurekoi lol sorry all done. bedside light is already over the tank lol i like to see it properly so i have the lamp in the back of the tank so it lights up the whole tank really well amd Apsolems colour come out really nicely

 

@Sean J btw i was a lil worried that the pixies didnt like the excel. thought it may be causing the leaf loss

 

Nope - my Pixies get daily doses and sometimes the 5 x dose to combat algae - no probs..... + it sits in like 6000l of flow(Aparently mine does not know that it is supposed to hate that...lol)

 

ok cool then i'll up the dosage, how much do you think i should be dosing in a tank that size? 0,1mls seems so lil and i dont want to harm Apsolem, Gary and the miniature catfish i got.