Most plants thrive between PH 5.5- 7.If ph is too high or too low plants cannot absorb nutrients properly.There are far less plants in the rift lakes of African due to high ph and hardness,but not void of some tough plants along the shores.
Yea Matt, pH of 8 will make it almost impossible unfortunately. I had the same issue in Toledo with some beautiful anubias I had that came out of a fully planted tank from a friend who moved out of town. His pH was low 7's, but my tank had aragonite which buffers water to 8-8.2 for my tropheus. Over a period of 6-8 my anubias did exactly what you're describing and i eventually pulled it out and gave it to someone else cause it looked awful. Vallisneria (val) does better in higher pH's but is a substrate rooting plant. If your discus are happy at pH 8 I wouldn't try to lower it if it were me as they're the center piece of you display, which looks awesome by the way. All the best mate
ya my discus are doing great so i really don't want to mess with the levels but thanks for the help looks like i may have to pull them at some point i liked the look of the planted discus tank it still looked good without the plants but i think the plants topped the tank off oh well
I would not give up all hope yet, I have Anubia in 5 of my (non discus) tanks. Although my KH is low (about 3) pH is 7.5 and although not as much as the discus tank I do change a fair bit of water and only dose micros. By using a moderate ammount of light and giving the plants kind of time to adapt like find their balance in the tank eventually the plants have turned out looking half decent
Last edited by Paul Sabucchi; 10-06-2018 at 09:57 AM.
ok thanks it seems like the anubias coffeefolia and the anubias bateri get hit the hardest as far as yellowing and leaves dying off the nanas don't seem like they get too much yellowing for whatever reason all the plants grow at a pretty steady rate but doesn't seem like they will flourish like they should with that high ph but thanks again for the reply
ya i want to get this figured out i really like the look of the planted tank its seems like the nanas do the best for whatever reason but some of the anubias strains are having alot worse deficiencys i may try to up the nitrate next time i make a batch of dry ferts i may add a little more nitrates to the bottle see if that may do anything
Last edited by matt2426; 10-06-2018 at 10:00 AM.
As you can see from the photo, plants including coffeifolia grow just fine but bear in mind the light in that tank is usually much more subdued, added a stronger one just to take the photo, as mentioned no CO2. Counterintuitively CO2 may be magnifying the lack of other nutrients. In a nutshell you have plenty of light and plenty of carbon, so you have plenty of fuel and spark for the plant's engine (the Calvin cycle) that because of this is revving pretty high. On the other hand other necessary things (like oil or coolant) may not be equally abundant so you have a problem
Matt, from my experience , i have found that anubias are not the easiest plants to keep them thriving , especially in a sterile discus tank . They always slowly die off or are struggling to survive in my planted discus tank.
On the other hand they always thrived In my overcrowded and not well maintained non discus tanks.
So don't beat your self up too much about not having success with them in your discus tank because it is not at all an easy task .
Raise the fertilizer graddualy in a course of 2 weeks to a double , or maybe even triple dose of your recommended PPS dosing regime and they should do better.
Meanwhile check your lights and their strength . For Anubias you should aim at 0.3-0.5 watts per liter of water or 25 -40 Lumens per liter of water .
Don't take them out if you really like their looks and don't loose hope .
Ok thanks Filip ill give that a try im going to start slowing upping the dose to see if that helps. the plants don't look horrible theres just a few plants that look bad but it seems like the plants that don't get alot of shade are the ones dying off the rest seem to be doing ok but thanks for the encouragment i'm going to keep trying is there an easier plant that might work better in discus tanks that may be worth trying thanks
I do fairly well in my tank with :
Hygrophila corymbosa or hygrophila polysperma ,
Nymphoides Hydrophilla - Taiwan ,
Ceratopteris Thalicroides or Ceratopteris cornuta ,
Echinodorus amazonicus or Echinodorus Ozelot ,
Sagitaria sibulata ,
Cryptocoryna usteriana or cryptocoryna wendtii,
Rotalla rotundofolia etc...
My water has Malawi lake hardness of 330 TDS , GH/ KH of 20 Dgh , pH 8.2 with 86 F temp. and I do not dose anything for this plants . I do have a fairly strong light source though - 162 Watts of T5 HO tubes with reflectors above only 65 gallons tank .
HTH Matt .