Sword Question

[karin]

As the title says, my red sword leaves have turned lacey and by that I mean they have a bunch of holes in them like the leaves are slowing are dissolving. Does that description make sense? This is a low tech low light set up. I use micronutrients, flourish, leaf zone and TPN (can't find TPN + in the US). I dose sort of a couple times a week and my anubias and cyrpts and vals are doing well. I remember reading this meant something but can't find it on a search.

Thanks folks for any help.

 

[RadaR]

I use micronutrients, flourish, leaf zone and TPN

Why do you have 3 different products that are virtually the same thing?

Dose more micro nutrients. If you dont want to do that, then you can simply pop a few "root tabs" under the sword.

Does the tank have any algae? Algae is a good indicator as to what your sword may be missing.

 

[karin]

Well, the reason for the 3 products is that I can't find the macro nutrients and before I decided on Flourish, I was fishing around for others. I thought the TPN was what everyone here was raving about but it is not the TPN+. Anyway, I'll get right on my dosing. I was doing a capful of Flourish once a week or once every 5 days. I'll up that a bit.

I have just a few tiny spots of green algae called beard algae on some manzanita wood in the tank. And I mean a total quantity of algae equal to a quarter or euro size. It is on the upper branches near the lights. This is a very low light tank at 1/2 watt a gallon and I did have the lights on for 12-14 hours. I just bought timers to reduce the light to 9 hours in two settings. The first in the AM is 5 hours and then lights off until evening when they are on for another 4 hours. This is for my enjoyment. I just did this. Could the Sword be in shock from the switch on lights?

It is a 60 gallon, fully fish stocked tank with 60% plants.

I'll dose some Flourish this AM and get a bit more precise about what I'm doing here.

I just did a water test, haven't done one for a while since everything going well. My ammonia and nitrites are 0, my Ph steady at 8.0 and my Nitrates are higher than normal at the 40-80 range. I can never tell those two colors apart on the API test kit. They had been at the 5-20 range last couple times I was testing. I disturbed a bunch of the sand yesterday though as I was aquascaping in my giant anubias that I just bought. I usually change about 10% of the water every week.

 

[RadaR]

Don't think the sword will be in shock. Most likely just hungry.

Nitrates are higher than normal at the 40-80 range

Nitrate test kits are notoriously innaccurate, useless bits of kit. Dont trust a word they say

Your long photoperiod of 12-14 hours probably brought about the algae near the top of the wood.

Plan of action is to just carry on as normal now. Lights on for total of 9hours and up the fert dosage.

 

[Ryefish]

i started off with leaf zone and ditched it for the flourish. I started over-dosing it every day rather than once a week and noticed a huge difference in the plants. ive only been using that up to now (buying TPN+ next week possibly). My photoperiod is 8hours