Can the spots be "brushed off" or are they bonded to the surface?

Donovan wrote in message
...
A friend of mine has a planted five gallon aquarium with a male betta,
a
apple snail and an amano shrimp in it. The lighting is eight watts, I
don't
know what the hardness/ph of the water is, but i'd imangine it's pretty
hard
and alkaline as he's using tap water treated with de-chlorinator and
stresscoat.

He has white specks showing up on his plants, small, perhaps .5 cm at
the largest, but ranging all the way down to almost invisible. They have
apeared on the plants leaves and stems, on vertical and horizontal
surfaces.
There are also a couple on gravel and one on the filter intake.

They don't move, once they appear they are stationary.

The spots seem to "perfer" the sword plants, but there is one on a
small
crypt also.

Any thoughts?

--donovan