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ferny troubles


Sophia

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have rescaped the tank today with a small piece of bogwood for the remaining ferns (bolbitis ratty leaves removed so practically just rhizome now), couple of bits of java fern and needle leaf, and the little piece of windelov. Bolbitis is facing into the current and all the ferns are now lower and not underneath the lights. That's the best I can do for them other than ferts and now it's up to them.

Space left by other wood is now filled with a retrospiralis crypt and a walkerii crypt. I have given them some JBL balls to chomp on and asked them very nicely to grow and not to melt.

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  • 1 month later...

Well here I am again with a new ferny trouble.

I bought some very nice windelov from KP, about a month ago, it was a fresh pea and dark green with lots of roots. I applied no sterilising anything, it went into a jug of water in the sun with some snail rid for under a week and that was all the quarantine it had.

After a week or so of being in the tank it started browning off a little but not in the same way as the java and bolbitis did. It had patchy brown bits and no new growths on the ends of the leaves, which the java fern did even though the rest of the leaves were browning off. Now it is almost completely brown and the leaves resemble spidery thin autumn leaves, with rare patches of green. I have cut back the ferts by about half so the current regime is standard dose of flourish comp and excel every 2 or 3 days. I thought maybe it was missing something else so I gave a dose of florapride on sunday for the water change and nothing has changed. The lighting has reduced since I put it in as the riccia and duckweed almost cover the surface. There is usually a gap of some sort in the front where I move it aside to feed the gobblers, but not necessarily the same place and it's not directly above any of the ferns. I have restrained myself from giving up on the windelov, I think maybe this is the browning off that Jen mentioned, or could it be the comment someone made that sometimes the ferns just don't like your tank. I have crypts, ambulia, riccia, duckweed and tiger lotus and they seem to be doing well.

The bolbitis is still tied to the wood in the current/inlet and has not produced any growth. I live in hope that it hasn't really died. There are some surviving baby javas too and a floating windelov baby that came from the main plant that is bright green - this I find odd. I want my windelov back :cry: or KP won't sell me any more plants :) :-? )

In any case, what are your thoughts dearest plant nerds?

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Hmmm, sometimes it can object to a change in environment. I would say hang in there and give it a few months and some new bits will grow back and they will be all sorted to like your tank conditions. I have windelov growing in every conceivable tank condition (high light/low light, high ferts/low ferts, high CO2/low CO2) and it will thrive just about everywhere once it has adapted to the tank. It might have also been the bright sunlight that stunned it.

It grows quite fast when supplemented with a good amount of trace nutrients and carbon (liquid carbon or CO2).

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I personally add heaps of ferts - I mean HEAPS - to my tanks and I don't have any problems, but my plants are used to it and they are growing very fast and have CO2/carbon so they can actually use the nutrients I provide. So, based on that I would say there is no need to cut back - but that is just my experience.

Remember, the light will increase the plants' demands for nutrients. The carbon will enable the plants to utilise nutrients. :wink:

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daily it is then

I have found that once bitten with excel or I suppose an oxidiser the twisted val doesn't seem to like it at all. This batch got bleached and complained, it's very slow at growing back and I've noticed more floppy dying leaves when I put excel in again. All my hopes are now pinned on the one stronger plant :wink:

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  • 3 weeks later...

not yet that I can see but it's not from lack of looking and wishing and keeping the ferts regular haha. There are some bright green stem/rhizome bits lingering and feeding my clutching at straws. If it's anything like the bolbitis (now a black root ball still tied to the wood) those were the last bits to die anyway.

The only thing I haven't done is sing to it. Maybe that's what's missing, I'd better learn to yodel

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  • 6 months later...

well it looks like I have offended my plants again :x

java and windelov ferns were growing slowly but in a healthy fashion, then I did a water change of approx 25% and didn't replace the salt content, then a couple of weeks after that they all started to die off again. Now the tiger lotus also started melting. I had about 12 leaves on there, now down to 3 :facepalm: changing salt is all I did, everything else is the same, other than less fish at the moment. Hopefully this time they will grow back quickly :an!gry

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