Just a small update. I think the key may be keeping them sediment/debris and algae free, either by flow or amano, and only putting them into seasoned aquariums. I moved most of my buces into my little nano tank so I could play with water parameters without having to worry about fish. This tank has a chunk of spiderwood in it that was "shedding," leaving little brown specs all over the place that I tried vacuuming out on a daily basis, but it was impossible to get it all. (the tank is too small and too crowded to fit anything in it other than the bare vacuum tube) I'd changed the substrate beforehand so the tank wasn't exactly mature and sure enough, between the wood and grey stringy algae I lost more of the minis-but the larger varieties are fine.
Tossed in three amano and overnight they had the thing cleaned up, which saved my pink malawi, a plant I really didn't want to lose. I haven't seen any new growth but it otherwise appears to be thriving. It's the only mini I have left besides some unidentified buce on a chunk of wood in my 20L, sold to me as "growers' choice" and slowly producing new growth.
I really like these plants so I'm determined to get this figured out, but it sure has been an expensive learning curve so far.
Tossed in three amano and overnight they had the thing cleaned up, which saved my pink malawi, a plant I really didn't want to lose. I haven't seen any new growth but it otherwise appears to be thriving. It's the only mini I have left besides some unidentified buce on a chunk of wood in my 20L, sold to me as "growers' choice" and slowly producing new growth.
I really like these plants so I'm determined to get this figured out, but it sure has been an expensive learning curve so far.
