Just Wondering What's Going On With My Plants

[dan15daman]

hi everybody,
I've had a 30g tank for two yaers and only last year decided to add plants. My lighting was one 20w powerglo, which was 18,000k. I have 5 or 6 swords and some sort of grass type of thing that's grown like crazy. I realize that I should probably add a lot more lighting, but my plants looked great for the first few months tough they don't grow fast. I use plant gro as a fertilizer which is iron enriched. Right now I'm just wondering why my plants are yellowing up and are transparent glassy, while they have algae growing all over their leaves. I've read things on plant illnesses but none of them show all these symptoms so I;m wondering if its a combo of many issues. the weird thing is that some leaves of the platns are [erfectly fine and the rest just look liek garbage. Yesterday I changed the lighting to floraglo which is also 20w but is lower in the spectrem That was according to advice from an lfs person. I don't ahve a CO2 stystem or nitrites or ammonia. Sorry my pics are bad of this but please give me some help if you think you can. thanks a lot!

30g
0 ammonia
0 nitrite
.25 nitrate

edit: attachments

http/i188.photobucket.com/albums/z245/da...pg?t=1199650394

 

[SuperColey1]

Almost definately the light is too low. 20W over 30G = 0.666WPG (This is assuming you are using proper reflectors too (not the white plastic inserts that come with the tank).

With T8s you should aim for at least 1WPG and need proper reflectors. If you were to add another bulb the same length in to get to 40W (1.333WPG) You should be OK.

Andy

 

[dan15daman]

Almost definately the light is too low. 20W over 30G = 0.666WPG (This is assuming you are using proper reflectors too (not the white plastic inserts that come with the tank).

With T8s you should aim for at least 1WPG and need proper reflectors. If you were to add another bulb the same length in to get to 40W (1.333WPG) You should be OK.

Andy

I did a little DIY with the reflectors. I know a guy who makes sattelites and has roles of tape that are too old for him to put up in space, but go froa pretty penny when new. Anyways they go on the sats to reflect the sunlight and are practically mirrors and work realyl well under the hood.

 

[SuperColey1]

so you have good reflectors you can rule that bit out but still need to have 1WPG+ for the plants really.

Andy