curled amazon sword leaves.
Hi all.
I have a planted 55 gallon tank: 120 watts of light (can easily be increased to 160) and DIY co2. Two of my plants are large amazon swords (purchased from the "new world aquarium" in manhattan). They both often have curled leaves... curled around towards the stem. These leaves are also often a very deep green. what might this be a sign of? Some of the other leaves get holes in them and yellow. Any suggestions would be appreciated. I would expect them to have lots of nutrients, since I'm using Eco-complete substrate. Thanks very much, Wes |
wes wrote:
Hi all. I have a planted 55 gallon tank: 120 watts of light (can easily be increased to 160) and DIY co2. Two of my plants are large amazon swords (purchased from the "new world aquarium" in manhattan). They both often have curled leaves... curled around towards the stem. These leaves are also often a very deep green. what might this be a sign of? Some of the other leaves get holes in them and yellow. Any suggestions would be appreciated. I would expect them to have lots of nutrients, since I'm using Eco-complete substrate. Thanks very much, Wes How are you fertilizing? Plants need more than Eco-complete. -- Elaine T __ http://eethomp.com/fish.html '__ rec.aquaria.* FAQ http://faq.thekrib.com |
Hi,
I have seachem's "flourish", but I've been reluctant to use it very much. Will it increase the hardness of my water significantly? I'm preparing to add discus to this tank... after my R/O unit arrives. I'm going to need good suggestions for a mineral balance which will work for the discus and for the plants, I guess.... walking a fine line, especially if I want the Discus to breed. -Wes |
wes wrote:
Hi, I have seachem's "flourish", but I've been reluctant to use it very much. Will it increase the hardness of my water significantly? I'm preparing to add discus to this tank... after my R/O unit arrives. I'm going to need good suggestions for a mineral balance which will work for the discus and for the plants, I guess.... walking a fine line, especially if I want the Discus to breed. -Wes According to http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_nutrient.htm leaf curling is a sign of calcium or possibly boron deficiency. Remember, you must have adequate nutrients in the water column to grow plants and Ca++ and Mg++ are essential minerals. If you are certain there is adequate Ca++ from your tap water, consider Flourish or Kent trace elements, iron, and potash (K) rather than the plain Flourish shotgun approach. There are inexpensive ingredients for rolling your own fertilizers at http://www.gregwatson.com if you want fine control. Here's Tom Barr's article on setting KH and GH in planted tanks http://www.sfbaaps.com/reference/barr_02_01.shtml and an excellent article by George and Karla Booth on planted discus tanks http://aquaticconcepts.thekrib.com/A...PAM_Discus.htm. Both agree that 2dGH and 3-4dKH is the lowest acceptable hardness for planted tanks. Tom likes Seachem Equilibrium to set hardness for RO water, but it does have some unnecessary Cl- and Na+ that you could partly avoid by using CaC03 and epsom salts (MgS04) to set the GH. The Booths also make a lot of points about temperature, choice of plants, and maintenance. I used their article to alter my own planted tank when I was given a discus for my birthday. The discus and most of the plants are doing fine - I lost some Sagittaria to the high temps, but that was the only casualty. (knock wood) -- Elaine T __ http://eethomp.com/fish.html '__ rec.aquaria.* FAQ http://faq.thekrib.com |
Thanks again for the reply!
I should have clarified... Currently, since my R/O unit hasn't arrived yet, my GH is at 10, and my KH at 6 or 7 or so. Perhaps Boron is my culprit? I'm going to dive into these articles now... thanks very much for the links! By the way, I should add, that some of my plants are doing really quite well... My dwarf aquarium lily, for example, has easily quadrupled in size in 2 weeks... I'm going to jump into these articles now. Thanks so much for the links! -Wes |
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