plants exponential growth... should i cut it?

[mikeang]

Hi,

After installing the ISTA MaxMin Co2 reactor last week, my plants seems to be having exponential growth. This first picture was taken last monday and the second picture taken this morning.

The plants grew by more than 2 inches in the last week resulting in it blocking my outlet.

The red plant (big leave one) however didn't do quite well. Many of the leaves melted and I had to cut and now left with 2 leaves. Thinking of removing it totally but pocket pain .. as it costed me $20 for that 2 plants...

My parameters are :

4 BPS for CO2
2 feet tank
8 hours lights on 48watt bulb
20% wc once per week
No fertisation used since I am trying to rid algae

My question are:

Can i trim the plants and should I?

What is causing this sudden growth? Is my parameter out?

Your help are most appreciated.

Thank you.

[cheetf]

Have you calculated how much CO2 your tank actually needs? Go to the Aquarium Calculator at the top and it will tell you how to measure it.

The exponential growth may be due to your overzealous use of CO2 and hence it may also explain why your 1 litre depletes so fast.

Can't really make out what the plants are, if they are hornworts the stem will rot if you bury it.Yours look like cabombas. Anyway if you want to trim the plants and make it bushy, you should trim as low as you can for the first time. It should grow a Y from there. Then trim the sides of the Y. From a single stem you keep on splitting it.

[mikeang]

Hi,

Yes, i did a check on google and it is Cabombas. Not sure what are plants on the extreme right but they seems to grow slower..

I want to keep them the way they are now and not too bushy... else later block my inlet and outlet...

any advice other than having to move them?

Thanks

[cheetf]

Can't make out the plant on the right.

Well you will have to trim them sooner or later.

You could reduce the lighting period to 6 hours or so, this should help your algae problem as well.

Cooler water also helps slow growth.

Maybe reduce the bps, the rate of growth increased exponentially because now the CO2 has been mixed in more efficiently by the reactor.

These are the few things that I can think of.