Possible nutrient deficiency?

Hi everyone

I have a 2 foot planted tank, with 3 anubias nana, glosso, h. micranthemoides, s. repens, amazon sword and Christmas moss. Anubias and christmas moss are wedged in knots in driftwood, and everything else is planted in Langa substrate. I am dosing Scape complete along with Flourish Excel and Flourish Advance (purely out of curiousity). Flourish Advance ran out about a week ago, and haven't bought a new bottle yet.

About 2 weeks ago i noticed that there are yellow spots appearing on my anubias leaves. The leaves are also starting to crinkle around the edges. This is on new and older leaves. The amazon sword and s. repens leaves are starting to go transparent and fall apart. The h. micranthemoides also seems to be struggling a bit, but didn't look to closely at that.

When i last checked the nitrate levels, they were at about 5. Ammonia and nitrite are zero, so filter is running as expected. The substrate did make the water quite soft and acidic though, as ph was 6.0. kH and gH were also really low.

I added 1 Seachem root tab under the s. repens and amazon sword respectively a couple of days ago, so too soon to see if that made a difference.

Any ideas on what else it could be?

Thanks,
Kean

 

Hi @fux940510

Welcome to the forum!

I am not the best at giving advice on planted tanks but Im sure our planted tank pros will soon chime in

Post some pictured of your setup, we love those!!

 

Hi fux ... post a few pics lets see the density of your plants ...

Later Ferdie

 

Thanks, will do. Will be cellphone pics though, so i'll see what i can do

 

Should be fine ... looking at the detail you have provided - what are you doing for Fe ?

Also the cocktails mentioned could be over supplying some nutrients making other less available.



as an example

this could also help ...



source from the internet - but lost the link .. use google image search to find the original articles.

Last note on Fe - different sources of Fe are available to the plants at different pH values - so that might be the real issue - your pH drops to low ?

all pure speculation.

Later Ferdie

 

Oh well
see images are playing silly again .. let me see if I can find you links.

Second pic from ...
https://praquatics.com/forums/threads/aquatic-plant-defiencies.320/


Mulders chart ..

https://cultivacegrowth.com/foliar-information/

Later Ferdie

 

Thanks for those links Ferdie, super useful. It appears it might be an NO3 or Fe deficiency, but i've attached some photos of the anubias and s repens

 

I would look at starting a new routine ... get a few WC under the belt to flush the system .. that should also help a bit with the pH. Then pic 1 thing say scape complete - and follow the EI method ( that is kinda what scape complete - local guys formulated it for) See if you see some new growth and then remove the older damaged leaves.

Double check your temps and light period - the plats are viable and recoverable - they bounce back way better than say fish ;-)

I am about easy and slowly does it ..

Fe I can kinda see - NO3 - hmm but an easy check. Again flush the system, then use KNO3 ONLY for a week or so .. see what pops up and what not.

Have a look at http://rotalabutterfly.com/ they have an easy fertz calculator and a developing deficiency page.

Later Ferdie

 

Cool, thanks.

My brother bought one of these for me: https://www.jungleaquatics.net/online-store/ISTA-Co2-Diffuser-Set-Canister-Type-p81594649

So I'm going to do a couple of big water changes - probably 60% every second day, and hold off on the fert dosing, set up the above CO2 thing and start dosing with Scape Complete after 2 changes.

Last i checked temp is around 24, and lights are on for 8 hours per day. I did have the intensity lowered, so i bumped it up a bit.

The older leaves on the anubias turning yellow and crinkling and the new leaf being white were a bit weird, because the plant was doing fine for quite a few months.

 

Hmmm Fe ... and or Mg

 

Checked tank this morning - white leaf is now a pale green

 

If you flushed the system and you seeing such quick recovery then one would suspect an oversupply rather than a deficiency?

Later Ferdie

 

I'm thinking it's due to lighting and crap eyesight - I did see the "white" leaf after getting very little sleep. I haven't done the water changes yet, that is due for tomorrow and Thursday.

 

Lol ... all good - most of the deficiency actually needs to be check out of the tank and in sunlight ... our lives are so polluted with artificial light that it is seldom the right environment to make these calls.

Being colour blind I hate making calls based on either colour change or a named colour - also one of the reasons why I do not wait my time with CO2 or pH checkers.

Later Ferdie

PS still do the WC - get a good working baseline - that is what EI is all about.

 

Big water change done - almost 70%.

Bell CO2 thing added, just to see what happens.

2 pumps of Scape Complete added.

No ferts added since Friday, so that in combination with the big WC should help.

I will post an update in about a week, and see how everything goes.

 

Update a little bit late, but here goes.

Did a big water change on Saturday, about 60%.

Ripped out all the moss i could find, as it was becoming a nuisance. Little fragments would break off and start to take over the entire tank. This isn't too bad in the smaller tanks i have, but with the scape in this tank it's a mission to find all the pieces.

S. Repens is going crazy. All the new growth is looking bright green and super healthy, may need to start trimming off tips soon and replanting.

Glosso looking a bit sad, might be due to cories and nerites uprooting them occasionally. There were a few healthy strands, but i had to adjust their position as they were heading into the s. repens cluster.

Anubias are starting to look better. Older leaves are still a bit off, but i will probably trim those off before the next WC.

Amazon swords are looking good. Couple of the lower leaves were disintegrating, so i plucked them off at the rosette.

Heminathus micranthemoides is looking stringy, and i regularly pull broken off strands out of the tank - i think one of the inhabitants is bulldozing through the bases. Either that or being placed in the output flow of the HOB is too much. I did try and place some smaller rocks to cover the base of the stems to small success, but still a problem. May need to find a better spot for it soon

I might need to rehome the betta into one of the 30 litre tanks soon too, as he's becoming a bit of a bully. I've spotted him chasing cories and the remaining rasbora quite a lot, so maybe his peaceful demeanor was due to not being fully grown yet.

I'm contemplating a restart on the tank, just to try some different plants and scaping ideas i have, but i will wait a few months before that happens