Brown spots on Amazon sword and anubias - request for advice - Pics inside

[jff_just4fun]

Hi,

The amazon sword and anubias leaves are developing brown spots on the leaves. I am hoping anyone of you experts out there can help me out.

The details of the tank are:

37g, (36"X12"X18")
Flourite substrate,
96W CF coralife aqualight for fresh water aquarium ( Kept on for 11-12 hours every day)
Tank temperature - 82 F
Tank set up 3 weeks old.(tank cycle started with one betta fish after the substrate settled in)
One canister filter (With Biomax media) and one power filter were installed
Plants were planted after 10 days of initial set up(Six harlequin rasboras and 3 sterbai cory fish approx 1" in length were introduced into the tank at this point)
Seven juvenile discus were added one week after the plants were added - (approximately 1.5" each)
Frozen shrimp for the fish as food (not much is left over at the bottom)
pH of water is 6-7
No fertilizers
No C02
10% water changes every other day ( Water treated with API water conditioner for removal of chlorine and ammonia)
Nitrite levels - 0 ppm


The plants currently in the tank are:

1- Amazon sword
1- Anubias nana (attached to drift wood with a cotton thread)
1 bunch - glosso
1- water lilly
1 bunch - Rotala Indica
1 bunch - Fern
1- Miscellaneous plant that came in the form of a bulb
1- Miscellaneous sword with curly leaves ( This was in a discus tank at the store)

The plants were doing fine for the first week. The new leaves were growing out almost every day.

But suddenly, I started observing brown spots on the leaves of Anubias and Amazon sword. These spots are growing and the effected leaves do not look healthy. The new emerging leaves look pale compared to the original leaves and they are semi transparant. Glosso leaves are turning yellow. But the new leaves are healthy and there are roots growing from the stems.

All the other plants look healthy. The links to the pics are at the following location
http://s797.photobucket.com/albums/yy253/jff_just4fun/

Could you please let me know what is going wrong in the tank? Also, what can I do to avoid further damage?

I am waiting for the Simenesis algae eaters to arrive at my local aquarium store.

Any advice in this matter is appreciated.

Thank you,
Prabhu
http://s797.photobucket.com/albums/yy253/jff_just4fun/

[Francis]

Hi
I kept plants for about 8 years now and I have experienced similar problem before. The Brown/balck spots are algea, I think, and the semi-transparent leaves normally caused by lack of certain nutrition for plants, such as K or Fe. If you add some K, Fe and some traces elements and CO2 (more light if you wish), plants will grow faster and hopefully out-compete the algea. I also tried different algae eating fish but non of them can really change anything though some of them look working very hard. If you are able to make plants grow fast enough and use up most of the balanced nutrition, most algae will dispear.
Cheers
Francis

[jff_just4fun]

Thank you Francis.

Yes, I added some SAEs and Oto-affinis. Seems like they are working hard but the problem is not gone yet. I will add some trace nutrients and liquid carbon this week and see if any thing changes.
As far as the plant growth is concerned, the bulb plants are growing much faster (almost two or three leaves a day approximately 5cm each).
But as you said, some trace elements might be missing which is causing the transparent leaves.

I will keep you updated.

Thanks,

Prabhu

[Chad Hughes]

Francis hit the nail on the head. Potassum and Iron are related to the spotting. Nutrient deficient to be exact. These plants are heavy root feeders. I would recomend root tabs or fertilizer sticks. Place them below the root ball about 2" away from the plant. The roots will find the ferts and use them. Your problems should disappear.

Best wishes!

[bs6749]

You have way too much lighting on that tank for not using CO2. You have the equivalent of 3.5 watts per gallon with those CF lights. Keeping the lights on for that long is just encouraging algae to grow since the plants can't use the nutrients due to lack of CO2. You should be adding CO2 to the tank in some form. You can use Flourish Excel to add CO2 to the tank. You will notice a great improvement if you do. I suggest that along with root tabs in conjunction with Flourish Comprehensive. Cut back your lighting to 5 hours until you can get ferts. This will help control the algae in the meantime.

[Chad Hughes]

I would agree with you, but there is NO algae issue. The plant tissue is turning brown. Classic iron deficiency!

Best wishes!

[jff_just4fun]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks for your comments.
I took out a sword leaf and washed it. Some of the spots washed away confirming that there is some brown algae on the leaves. Some of the spots are inherent, suggesting the iron deficiency as you mentioned.

I cut back on the lighting for a bit and increased water changes. I ordered some dry chemicals for ferts.

Does anyone of you know the chemical composition of the excel? Could anyone suggest a dry chemical that can be made into a solution to be used as carbon source?

Thanks,

Prabhu