Curled leaves...pls help..

[ranmasatome]

Hello,

So after 5 weeks of trying the new Seachem equi. regime i made for myself to see if my curled leaves were the cause of a ca deficiency...i finally believe that it is NOT.... MY leaves are STILL Curled!!!! ergh!!!

Suprisingly enough i found that most of my plants are doing well except for ANY rotalas and ANY ludwigia that i put into this tank all end up with curled and mangled leaves!!! ALL other plants are okay.... WHY is this?? am i missing somthing that only these plants need?? i cant figure it out and am at my wits end... if nothing works i'll probably try a new fert reigme besides the one i'm using which is LGA/LGM along with KNO3 and Po4 doses...

Below is a list of the new regime for my 50gal (3feet) tank running at 182watts (i recently just upgraded to 220watts)... Any advise would be VERY much appreciated..

Sunday : waterchange + dose 1.5ppm of Po4 + KNo3 (12ppm No3 - 7.8ppm K)
monday : 16 drops of LGM
Tuesday : 10ml of LGA
WEdnesday: same as monday
thurs : Same as tuesday
Fri : monday thingy again
Sat : tuesday thing again..

Element Weekly ppm Total
N 1.69139
NO3 7.49045 (therefore total No3 would be 19.5ppm)
K 12.18322 (And total k would be 19.9ppm)
S 3.92678
Mg 0.69314
Fe EDTA 0.66357
Mn 0.21561
B 0.08005
Zn 0.02943
Cu 0.00925
Mo 0.00969

[PeterGwee]

You had the nutrients well taken care (Drop the use of LGA and use KNO3 and KH2PO4 instead..do the KNO3/KH2PO4 every alternate day with LGM since you use a lot of light!) of which leaves only one thing and the most important thing of all if you use it (CO2).

Sunday - KNO3/KH2PO4
Monday - LGM
Tuesday - KNO3/KH2O4
Wednesday - LGM
Thursday - KNO3/KH2PO4
Friday - LGM
Saturday - Water change followed by KNO3/KH2PO4

Add more CO2 for your case.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[ranmasatome]

Thanks peter...
i'm sure my CO2 is okay because i've tried going higher and as a result lost 5 of my M. Kubotai... they are really sensitive fish...

the reason why i was using LGA was because the trace amounts in LGM was so low.. so if iwas only to use LGM then i would be using ALOT of it.. Also LGA provides Nitorgen, sulpur and magnesium which LGM does not... Can i really afford to skip out of LGA when its providing all of these??

Thanks..

[PeterGwee]

i'm sure my CO2 is okay because i've tried going higher and as a result lost 5 of my M. Kubotai... they are really sensitive fish...

Are you getting good pearling rates? Do you have any surface movement? Try to get some moderate surface movement going and you should able to add more CO2.

the reason why i was using LGA was because the trace amounts in LGM was so low.. so if iwas only to use LGM then i would be using ALOT of it.. Also LGA provides Nitorgen, sulpur and magnesium which LGM does not... Can i really afford to skip out of LGA when its providing all of these??

You can drop the LGM and dose the LGA instead. Try to get a total of 7-8ppm of NO3 per dose with LGA together with the KNO3. I do not like things mixed into one as it lacks flexibility and you should try to dose the KH2PO4 on seperate day or maybe a couple of hours later to prevent possible precipitation of Fe from occurring.

Doing the EI method eliminates the possilibity of nutrient issues and places focus on one thing and that is CO2 (light you have plenty).

Regards
Peter Gwee

[ranmasatome]

Hi Peter,

Yeah..i have surface movement with a fan blowing 45degrees at the water so it moves about in a wavy format.. my pearling rates are very good...every night the tank is like boiling...bubbles everywhere..

i totally understand what you mean by flexibility... thats was the reason why i am considering switching over the seachem Flourish.. it has everything i need and has no No3 or K (negligible amounts anyway) in it. the problem with LGA is that it has more k then No3..so when i dose KNO3 with it i have to balance both the formulas so i get 30ppm of NO3 and 22ppm of K.. it is quite a headache actually..Perhaps i should smplyfy this and just switch over to Seachem flourish with KNo3 and Po4 for my dosing regime..u think this would be better?

i've also heard that there are other nutrients that may cause limitation in uptake of Ca.. high k for example.. there are people on APC with Ca rates of 50ppm and still have Ca defeciency..its ridiculous.. i've also posted there and they reccommended that i use lime stone or lime to raise Ca to 100ppm..which i can do but am apprehensive about...don know how true this is..but at this point anything is worth a shot.

[PeterGwee]

Hi Peter,

Yeah..i have surface movement with a fan blowing 45degrees at the water so it moves about in a wavy format.. my pearling rates are very good...every night the tank is like boiling...bubbles everywhere..

i totally understand what you mean by flexibility... thats was the reason why i am considering switching over the seachem Flourish.. it has everything i need and has no No3 or K (negligible amounts anyway) in it. the problem with LGA is that it has more k then No3..so when i dose KNO3 with it i have to balance both the formulas so i get 30ppm of NO3 and 22ppm of K.. it is quite a headache actually..Perhaps i should smplyfy this and just switch over to Seachem flourish with KNo3 and Po4 for my dosing regime..u think this would be better?

i've also heard that there are other nutrients that may cause limitation in uptake of Ca.. high k for example.. there are people on APC with Ca rates of 50ppm and still have Ca defeciency..its ridiculous.. i've also posted there and they reccommended that i use lime stone or lime to raise Ca to 100ppm..which i can do but am apprehensive about...don know how true this is..but at this point anything is worth a shot.

Consider lowering the light to around 2.5-3w/g and see if things improve then. If nutrients are the issue, lowering the light should improve things along with demand for CO2. Give the plants some time to recover as well. Seems like the tips were stunted due to lack of NO3 sometime ago and needs time to recover once the conditions are corrected. The K inhibition thing is not true.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[ranmasatome]

Thanks Peter,
but i dont know if it is a problem with No3...i may be wrong so pls feel free to correct me..
Even with the present regime which i presume have enough No3 (30ppm) i've place perfectly healthy roatala vietnam and rotala pusilla into the tank and within 2 -3 weeks the leaves start to curl...the perfectly healthy leaves are still there but when the new growth appears the leaves are always small and curled...assuming i'm hitting the right amounts of No3 weekly now which is 30ppm... can this still be a No3 problem? Do i need to increase my No3 to higher than 30ppm?? And what do you feel about the migration over to seachem flourish?

thanks again..

[PeterGwee]

Thanks Peter,
but i dont know if it is a problem with No3...i may be wrong so pls feel free to correct me..
Even with the present regime which i presume have enough No3 (30ppm) i've place perfectly healthy roatala vietnam and rotala pusilla into the tank and within 2 -3 weeks the leaves start to curl...the perfectly healthy leaves are still there but when the new growth appears the leaves are always small and curled...assuming i'm hitting the right amounts of No3 weekly now which is 30ppm... can this still be a No3 problem? Do i need to increase my No3 to higher than 30ppm?? And what do you feel about the migration over to seachem flourish?

thanks again..

NO3 sounds fine then. Consider changing the trace mix to regular Seachem Flourish (not the trace..just Flourish). Add 5ml per 20gal of tank water should cover the traces well. Trim off the stunted tips since the tissues are useless and are dead. Up the rate of the CO2 a tad bit also. Once you get the nutrients regime down, you can only have one possible cause of issue and the biggest of them all...CO2. Nothing works if the CO2 is not high and good during the day. Do give the weeds sometime to bounce back though.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[ranmasatome]

Hi Peter,

Thanks so much for the help.. i've actually been thinking it thru these few days and conincidentally this is exactly what i have done even b4 you posted!!..hahaha..
Well..i'll see what happend about 5 weeks down the road..
will keep you guys updated..
Co2 is good now i just meaured.. ph 6.7, Kh ~4.5..that gives me 27ppm..

[PeterGwee]

Co2 is good now i just meaured.. ph 6.7, Kh ~4.5..that gives me 27ppm..

Don't trust it too much though. Plants are the best test kits in the end. If something is not right, add a tad more CO2 and monitor the critters and weeds for that week. Repeat the next week so on and fore till things are good or when the critters start to act funny (heavy breathing), then back off to the last safe level.

Regards
Peter Gwee