Emersed HC Fungus Help

brentling

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Sep 10, 2008
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I have been growing HC emersed for about 6-7 weeks and it has gone quite well, up until this last week. I have kept water in the tank up to the level of the substrate (Turface MVP). The substrate dried out just a bit, now I have white fungus (kind of spider webby) that has taken out 2 clumps of HC. I am concerned that it will spread. The HC is growing with Glosso, Crypts and Lobelia cardinalis short form and all are doing great with the exception of the fungus. My thinking is to flood the tank a bit and drown the fungus, but I thought I'd check with y'all first. The HC seems well rooted now and has spread significantly. Any suggestions?
 

quicksilver02

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Apr 21, 2009
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Sorry for digging up an old thread, but I'm running into the same thing growing emersed HC and Eleocharis acicularis in Aquasoil. Did you ever get rid of it, or did you just end up filling the tank?

I've read that this white web-like fungus is common for those setting up terrariums for frogs, and they don't worry about it much. Most say it goes away eventually, or they ad springtails to feed off of the fugus (I'm not sure if this would be a good idea for an aquarium using the dry start method).
 

Tom Barr

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Dry the tank out some, then the fungi goes away.

Regards,
Tom Barr
 

Philosophos

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Excel should help with things as well. Glutaraldehyde is generally biocidal; it's used for sterilizing equipment, you'll find references to its use with fungus in several journals. If it's in rock wool or inert substrate with low water retention, just emerge the growth for a few minutes with a heavy excel dose then drain.

-Philosophos
 

quicksilver02

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Apr 21, 2009
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Drying things out a bit seems to be helping. There's still some fungus, but it's less than there was before.

While researching using dry ferts, I learned that KH2PO4 is a fungicide. I suppose misting the tank down with a weak solution could help get rid of fungus too. Does this sound like something that would work for this sort of problem? I don't think I need to take do this in my case at this point, as drying things out is working, but I'm just curious about the usefulness of using KH2PO4 as a fungicide in this case.
 

rthomas

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Oct 25, 2007
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quicksilver02;37547 said:
... but I'm just curious about the usefulness of using KH2PO4 as a fungicide in this case.

I have waiting for over a week in the hope one of the big boys would answer this interesting question.
 

Philosophos

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rthomas

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Oct 25, 2007
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Thank you Philosophos.

So the next question would be, "what would the concentration be like" ?
 

Philosophos

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Now that one I'm a bit short on academic material for.

I did find this:
http://www.haifachem.com/download/files/multi-mkp_1.pdf

Under the, "Foliar Feeding" section for their recommended dose of 1%.

I have no reason to think that this product is anything other than pure KH2PO4. They're calling it MKP- a shortened version of monopotassium phosphate. Their product analysis also matches perfectly with KH2PO4.

So this may not be perfect, but it's at least a reference to start from.

I've got to get headed out here, I'll come back to this if I've got some time later today.

-Philosophos
 

airriick

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May 29, 2009
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If you guys still have this problem, I just added in a few yellow shrimps and they cleaned up all my HC :D but becareful they also unroot them ..
 

quicksilver02

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Apr 21, 2009
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Biollante;38977 said:
Did anyone try the KH2PO4 or the MKP to kill fungus?

Biollante

I just dried my tank out a bit by uncovering it during the day and recovering it at night. The fungus went away after a week or two. I still think the idea of KH2PO4 as a fungicide is interesting and may work for emersed setups, but it wasn't needed in my case.

My HC is growing really nicely emersed now with no fungus. Hopefully I'll be filling the tank with water in a few weeks.

60h-front-jul31.jpg
 

Biollante

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Thanks! I also suspect the "drying out" is likely most effective, I am culturing some fungi and am going to try a couple of methods.

The HC looks nice!

Biollante
 

jonny_ftm

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Mar 5, 2009
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You really have to stop misting for avoiding fungus. Plants should grow with dry leafs --> no fungus. If you mist 1-2x/15d is ok

Soil, must be moisted, but no water on surface at all --> no mold, no algae, no moss

If you use a mineralized soil, add some casting, and use water from a cycled EI aquarium, you shouldn't need any KH2PO4. Even if you don't have an EI cycled aquarium, if you use casting, you shouldn't need any PO4 or NO3 additives