Hairy Plants - Pics...

[Ryan_W]

475L tank
1x FX-5
1x Eheim 2078
2mm grain sand substrate
Feeding small amounts 2 or 3 times daily
50% WC weekly
Dosing with EasyCarbo 10ml daily
2x 58W 5" T8 tubes
10 hours of light a day

Why are my plants looking like this?!

It's really annoying me since I can't see where I'm going wrong?!

The water is only dirty since I'd been moving the wood around.

Please help me!!!!

Ryan

 

[Verminator89]

Is this the tank from the New World Cichlid section Ryan?

Using liquid ferts on a tank this size is your problem IMO, i'm no guru on this matter though, and i see ianho is also watching this thread, he'll give you far better advice.

 

[Ryan_W]

Yea it is James.

I've only been using the liquid carbon for the past week to try and reduce the algae.

 

[term_22000]

I know when I didn't have enough lighting on my plants that they started doing the same thing, I trimmed it up and added more light and a little fert and it cleared right up...

 

[ian]

10 ml of easycarbo on this tank isn't really going to touch it. It looks like Oedogonium to me, caused by low C02 and low nutrients. Are you giving your plants anything else but Easycarbo?

 

[Ryan_W]

I've upped the EasyCarbo to 15ml a day from today. The only other fert I'm using (every 2 weeks) is E15 FerActiv by Dennerle.

 

[GrayScale]

What's the flow like in there?

 

[mark4785]

If I remember rightly, you should only dose 1ml of Easy carbo per 50 litres of aquarium water, which in your case equates to just over 9ml (for 475 litre of water). You should only really be applying 2ml per 50 litres if you have many many plants and high lighting according to an Easy Life leaflet I have.

I think the Easycarbo dosage is a problem in itself. Maybe start injecting c02 instead?

As for the problem with the plants, I haven't come across such a problem before so I can't tell you what you're doing wrong.

Mark.

 

[Ryan_W]

What's the flow like in there?

Flow is excellent. The pictures above are of plants right beneath the 2078s spray bar.

 

[Verminator89]

I really think that dosing liquid ferts is useless on anything over 200L. You need pressurized ideally, its expensive to set-up and not so bad to maintain i find. Perhaps try cutting down on your photoperiod to say 8 hours, you chose which 8 hours, but less light may help. Alternatively perhaps keep it at 10 hours but break it into two 5 hour periods. Supposedly the break in photoperiod doesnt affect the plants as much because they can cope with it, but algae doesnt cope so well. Its an idea.

Untill you get to the root of the issue though you won't really know.

 

[Ryan_W]

It's driving me nuts... I love my natural plants but have have to go artificial if this problem doesn't pass....

 

[Ryan_W]

As for filtration I have the FX5 outlet and one end, one nozzle pointing up and one pointing diagonally down, it's about 5" under the water level. The inlet is at the other end of the tank, about 5" under the water level.

The 2078 has the spray bar pretty much in the middle of the tank, with the water being pushed across the top. The bar itself is about 1" under the water level. The inlet is located a little below the FX5's, about 2" from the bottom (it doesn't suck any sand up)...

I have one largish plant near the FX5s outlet, about 12" away which creates a bit of a barrier of the water flow, but nothing much.

My tanks at 26 degrees, 10 hours of light a day and has pretty decent filtration. The water isn't particle free, but very clean and clear...

Can anyone help me?

Ryan

 

[Verminator89]

Filtration is key for the fish. Circulation is key for the plants. Remember this.

Unfortunately is a fine balance between, light intensity, photoperiod, circulation, CO2, ferts and even stocking.

Without knowing what is causing your algae growth its hard to suggest what to do. Perhaps have your lights on 10 hours max, but split it into two stints during the day. Two 5 hour slots with and hour of lights off inbetween, algae struggles with adapting to this yet plants don't. Also perhaps splitting your water changes down to twice weekly might be worthwhile. So if you did 50% weekly, perhaps try 30% twice a week. Smaller obvious things like reducing feeding might help.

If you say that a plant 'could' be tinkering with circulation move the plant elsewhere perhaps. Koralias are an option, even the cheapest one will assist in moving bodies of water into new areas of the tank. Even going down the synthetic plant route your still going to have algae, atleast i do in my Rio 300.