Deficiency?

[csmith]

Is this a potassium deficiency?

I'm ruling out snails for now, as it's only on these two leaves. I've had that fun before.

 

[Philosophos]

Potassium or CO2. I've had holes in larger leaved plants develop from both.

What's your dosing like?

 

[csmith]

I've used the Seachem line of products on this tank for quite a while. It wasn't until I found this website that I understood exactly what I was purchasing (the whole 90% water, 10% fertilizers). Will definately be switching to dry ferts once I'm out of these. The substrate is regular ol' Flourite.

-Sunday
5 mL excel, 1 mL iron, 0.6 mL phosphorous, 0.6 mL nitrogen, 1 mL flourish
-Monday
2 mL excel, 1 mL iron, 2.5 mL trace
-Tuesday
2 mL excel, 1 mL iron, 1.7 mL potassium
-Wednesday
2 mL excel, 1 mL iron, 0.6 mL phosphorous, 0.6 mL nitrogen, 1.5 mL trace
-Thursday
2 mL excel, 1 mL iron, 1.7 mL potassium
-Friday
2 mL excel, 1 mL iron, 1 mL flourish
-Saturday
50% water change

10 gallon tank, 40w CF 6,700/10,000 light fixture (Current USA). I know it's way too much light, but again didn't figure that out until I came here and started reading. I have a strip of toilet paper running the length of the light on top trying to kill some of the lighting. Seems to have been effective as I don't have near the algae problem I did before. I actually maintained hair algae, BBA, GSA and BGA at the same time even though as far as I've read they all need different water parameters. The only one I have left is some moderate green spot algae growth on the glass, but I'm working that out. Mon-Fri the lights are on 8AM-12PM, then 4PM-8PM. Sat-Sun they are on 12PM-8PM. The weekend schedule is mainly for my convenience, as I'm more likely to do water changes in the morning than having to wait until the afternoon. Excel is actually dosed twice daily Mon-Fri, meaning 2mL between 5:30-6:00 AM, then another two around 4:00-5:00 PM. Until I started doing that I was getting absolutely no growth, but my foreground plants seem to finally be reproducing. I made a slow transition with the excel (from 1mL daily), so the shrimp don't seem to mind.

Two ozelot swords, 4 saggitarius planted in the back, 4 of something (maybe chain swords?) planted in the front, and some plant I've had since last year (that required heavy pruning repeatedly due to the BBA) on the left and right (towards the bottom of picture 2 and 3). Can anyone ID my mystery plants? Also, the saggitarius keep burying the tips of their leaves into the substrate (as can be seen in the second picture under the heater). No matter how many times I pull it out, it always ends up like that. Is this it's way of reproduction, or are mine just odd?
Bioload is simple with 2 dwarf frogs, 2 ottos and however many shrimp there are now considering one is always carrying eggs.

 

[Philosophos]

I don't have time to go real in depth here, but your dosing is severely limiting. Try dosing 12ml/wk of N, 16ml/wk of P, 12ml/wk of K+, keep flourish comprehensive dosing the same, drop the trace, dose 1/3 of your iron.

You should be fine with 5ml/day of excel toxicity wise.

Glad you've got something blocking the light. If the BBA doesn't go away with better dosing/more excel, you may have to push it farther. Try spot treating the BBA with excel via pipette.

If you've still got questions before you want to try any of this, I can get a longer reply in a day or two from now.

 

[Tug]

Happy New Year!

Hi csmith and Philosophos
I see it as somehow related to potassium deficiency, not csmith's circumstance. I'm trying to tie in some threads for people who dose MgSO4, Epsom salt. Excessive levels of Mg could induce a K deficiency.

 

[csmith]

-Philosophos
I'll give that boost a try. Out of curiousity though, being that short in my routine how have I gotten everything to stay alive thus far? Perhaps the plants just adapted over time. Come to think of it, my lean dosing is probably why all of my stemmed plants have always done weird things such as the leaves twisting around on themselves, or just never opening.

-Tug
I'm from Tennessee, can you use smaller words? My water isn't all that hard. PH was 7.8 out of the tap. I don't recall KH and GH numbers, but when I tested them they weren't a cause for any concern.

Is there any reason why I shouldn't be dosing excel even on water change days? As there are still nutrients in the water, wouldn't the plants need the carbon? Or is it as simple as the CO2 from the water change is enough for that day?

 

[csmith]

My green spot algae is growing at a very accelerated speed across my glass. Is this due to my lean dosing (as posted in #3 above), or perhaps something else? I don't believe I can really up the excel dosing. Perhaps I still have too much light getting through the toilet paper liner (though I don't understand how)?

I've searched through and found upping phosphate dosing being recommended. Is this a cure-all per se, or is it case by case?

 

[Tug]

Never add more then 5mL per 10 Gal. a day w/Excel.

If your going to increase the amount of PO4 (good idea), your plants will take up more CO2, NO3 and K from the water column. Thus, add the excel as suggested for carbon, keep up with your water changes and follow the dosing suggested by Philosophos. If your not fond of Excel then add a DIY CO2/yeast reactor and dose less Excel.

IME, GSA will go away if your PO4 levels are close to 2ppm. Poor water flow and low CO2 should be improved were possible, always.

Philosophos - I had no idea of the killing Seachem makes from their line of products. When dosed at levels comparable to EI, it looks like the LFS should prosper financially as well.

 

[csmith]

So what your saying is I should move the phosphate dosing on Sunday to a different day than the flourish? Also, if iron and phospate do as you say, should I cancel the iron dosing? If that's so, given I'm using Flourite could I just cancel iron dosing all together?

I too was unaware of how all of these "commercial" fertilizers were made as far as fertilizer to water ratio, and the amount of money they save doing so. Dry ferts are definately the way to go as soon as I run out of my stock.

 

[csmith]

Is there a water pump suitable to the 10 gallon aquarium? My filter (Marineland Penguin 100) doesn't quite do it, and I've tried a Koralia nano but it put out way too much water (and caused everything to lean over ) so I'll be incorporating that into my 55 gallon tank. Does anyone know of one more suited to the smaller tank? I contemplated upgrading to one of the smaller canister filters, but I couldn't really justify to myself spending $100 on a filter for a tank that small when all I use the filter for is mechanical filtration.

 

[Tug]

So what your saying is...

That sounds about right. I'm going to say your 10 gallon tank has a 30L water column. Then each time you dose flourish your adding ~ 0.1ppm iron, which is perfectly fine as it is. If you want to dose a little more, 1/3 of the flourish iron dose (0.33mL) adds ~ 0.1ppm, (0.5mL dose ~ 0.16mL). Just add it when you add your flourish. Dose the phosphate on different days. For example,
-Sunday
excel, phosphorous, nitrogen, potassium (can all be dosed at the same time)
-Monday
excel, iron, flourish
-Tuesday
excel, nitrogen, phosphorous
-Wednesday
excel, flourish
-Thursday
excel, iron, potassium, nitrogen (I've added an odd day like this to show it is only PO4 that causes problems when added with iron, not nitrate or potassium)
-Friday
excel
-Saturday
50% water change
flourish (water change will add CO2)
This is a ruff example. Nothing is written in stone. For instance on Thursday you're better off dosing the phosphorous and dropping the iron on that day.

 

[csmith]

Going back to a previous question I've asked, would there be a benefit in dosing excel on the rest days? Wouldn't this continue the boost in uptake for plants? I'd figure that CO2 injection doesn't seem to be stopped a day a week, so why would organic carbon. Perhaps I'm way off.

Also, thank you for your help.

 

[Tug]

Oops

Actually, a lot of things were off on that last post. Sorry about that - got distracted by dinner. I've gone back to edit it.

This is a good thread explaining some of the different methods out there.
http://www.barrreport.com/showthread.php/3205-Fertilizer-routines-which-one

 

[Tug]

+1 caveat

I completely agree with Philosophos. Increase your dosing levels of N & P as he suggested - because it looks as if you have no fishes (besides, it makes me look smarter then I really am ). Anyway, no fish ~ no fish food ~ no fish waist (ammonia and phosphate). But, the dose for KNO3 may go down when the few plants you have can depend on the number of fish you add as another nitrogen source. Adding a little more to insure non-limiting amounts is good too. You might find that adding 6ppm /dose 3X week is fine, most do. Or, watch your plants as you lower the dose while trying to find that sweet spot .

This sweet spot might also allow you to reduce the frequency of water changes. Of course the excel throws a wrench into the machinery (think of my brain as an old rusty gear box). I do not use excel nor do I know how it breaks down.
Dosing excel might require a weekly water change just on it's own due to some buildup of something or other. If not, until you add fish you may not even need to do the weekly water change. Calling all Gurus.

I did find something on excel and number of water changes required for a planted tank w/fauna.

25-50% weekly, 2x a month etc is fine with Excel.
No WC without Excel though.

 

[csmith]

Yesterday I dumped the 40W CF lighting for 28W CF lighting. Can I safely keep the same dosing recommended earlier, or should I cut it back a bit in lieu of less lighting?

Also, as it turns out, what I thought was a GSA problem could quite possibly actually be GDA. I took a razor blade and cut off quite a bit from the glass, and it came off in "sheets" I can only describe as having the appearance of green wax paper. Will my increased ferts solve this?

 

[nipat]

Yesterday I dumped the 40W CF lighting for 28W CF lighting. Can I safely keep the same dosing recommended earlier, or should I cut it back a bit in lieu of less lighting?

Don't know your situation, but I've cut it back.

Also, as it turns out, what I thought was a GSA problem could quite possibly actually be GDA. I took a razor blade and cut off quite a bit from the glass, and it came off in "sheets" I can only describe as having the appearance of green wax paper. Will my increased ferts solve this?

My GDA was like dust when wiped and GSA is really like wax.

About increasing ferts to solve GSA, I don't have answer since
I just have a few dots of them and see no obvious change in quantity
with less or more ferts.

 

[Biollante]

19 g Monobasic and Dibasic 7 g

Hi C.,

For the algae, during a water change, after scraping and cleaning as much as you can, take a mixture of 200 or 300 ml distilled water and 3 ml of Fleet Enema (or the knock-offs, make sure it is the Sodium Phosphate (19 g Monobasic and Dibasic 7 g)).

Spray or wipe the solution on the glass and any hard scape all the way to the substrate.

Doing a big water change in a couple of days is helpful.

You can repeat this as many times as you wish.

Biollante

 

[csmith]

Aquatic Epiphany!

I've discovered something about my 10 gallon tank, namely the ozelot swords. There are two types of leaves, some that are 80% stem with an oval leaf primarily green, then others that are maybe 15-20% stem with a large "wavy" leaf giving the plant it's color reddish color. Please forgive my ignorance as it comes to the differences in leaves, as I can't actually name the type of leaf but the following pictures will be a good visual. Moving on, I only see brown spots developing on the long stemmed oval leaves. The longer "wavy" leaves are developing what I can only describe as slits in the leaves. None have actual holes, they look more like someone has taken a knife and cut a slit into the leaf. Again, forgive the inability to accurately describe this.

"Oval" leaves

"Wavy" leaf

Same slit on another plant

What's the difference between the two leaves and why are they affected differently?

All in all the boost in ferts seems to have helped with overall growth. There's a big difference between now and pictures in post #3.

 

[Biollante]

Hi,

I do not know how long you have had the plant. The more oval leak looks to have been from its emerged form, the wavy ones grew underwater with, best guess, poor CO2 and lean nutrient dosing. It likes iron.

Most E ozelot are grown emerged to give thicker stronger plants. Essentially a 10-gallon tank will allow it to emerge. Give it room and it will grow up out of the tank, give it 14 hour light period and it will flower, send up a stalk a foot or so. It is self-fertilizing so the seeds can be grown, talk to Detritus Mulm.

Biollante

 

[Philosophos]

Leaf distortion is definitely a CO2 kind of thing. Next up would be magnesium; what's it look like in your tap water?