My Plants quit growing....

[noclueman]

I bought my tank about 6 months ago, it's only a 10 gallon.

I got some sand, cleaned it all out several times in a bucket till the water was clear. I filled the tank to about 2 inches then filled it with water. Put the filter on and let it go for a few days, then I bought a couple plants and a rock.

Left that for a few days then I bought some tetra's and zebra danios.

The Hornwort grew so fast I was able to cut parts off and replant them....within about 3 weeks I had cut enough off to give to a friend with a 50 gallong tank. Mine and his both continued growing like crazy.

I also had another plant (I don't know the name). Half inch or so green blades come out from the center and kind of curve open. I wish I knew the name but I don't. Anyway, it was about 7 inches tall when I bought it and during the same timefram it had grown to the top of the tank so I trimmed off the tallest ones. After about another week I noticed it was sprouting up an entire new plant about 5 inches away.

Gradually both plants quit growing, after about 4 months the hornsword died off completely. The grass blade plants (both) are still doing fine, but neither one has grown, the small one has blades maybe 2 inches long and both of them looks a little sad.

In the last couple weeks I have bought 2 new plants, one was an Alternanthera Reineckii which came with about 5 stalks. 3 of them have died already and the other 2 aren't doing so well. I also bought another plant that I don't have the name for but it has pretty big leaves that are green on one side and purple on the other side. It is doing ok also, but about 6 large leaves have fallen off already and I can't tell if it's making roots or not.


I do not know much about plants, but I've been reading on the board here about possiblities for furtilizing, which I have never done.

I do have 9 fish in there now. I just use a regular aquaclear mini filter.

Any ideas on what I can do to keep my plants healthy?

Thanks
Ran322

 

[noclueman]

I forgot to mention, I do have an incandescent lamp that is quite bright. (I don't know the spec's on it right off hand)

 

[Nisha]

It sounds like your plants ran out of ferts so you will need to add them. Seachem's Flourish is a liquid fertiliiser you can add to your sand substrate. Some stick ferts are also available.

Another option would have been to have some flourite or other iron-rich substrate for your plants. Eco-complete and Seachem's Onyx are two other good substrates for plants.

Lighting is also important. 2-3 Watt of light per gallon are needed if you're growing plants with higher light needs. It's good to do some research before choosing your plants. Alternanthera Reineckii and other red leaved plants often require higher levels of light. Java ferns and Anubias often thrive in very low light conditions and are good, hardy plants to have.

Last but not least is the CO2 levels in your tank. If you want a very heavily plnted tank then adding extra CO2 is an option but you don't need to worry about that for the moment.

Here is a good link to give you some more details about planted tank basics. Planted Tank Basics.
Here is a link to Tropica where they have the plants listed and give care information.

Hope this helps.

 

[noclueman]

Thank you very much, that's great info.

 

[Bangin]

Ten gallon tanks require a little more light than bigger tanks, in terms of wpg ratio.

You may want to check the nitrate levels too. I had a problem with plants using all the nitrates, so there was no food left for them to grow.