# poor plant growth



## edman2012 (Mar 26, 2013)

Unfortunately, I have yet to have had healthy plant growth. I've had my tank up for 5 months, with what I think in theory are better conditions than my old tank, yet I have had worse conditions. In my old 26 gallon tank, I achieved approximately 0.6 watts per gallon (6500k) and only added potash and iron supplements, and in the current 50 gal I get about 3wpg (6500k), and use nutrrafin plant gro which contains half a dozen micro-nutirents. At first I thought perhaps the problem was that my tank hadn't matured yet, but I don't think that's it anymore. What am I doing wrong? I still have the stock light bulbs, so I will consider changing them and see if it makes a difference. Two just blew out anyways.... Please view the pictures attached and captions.



Here's the old 26. The only plants I had were wisteria and Hygrophila corymbosa. 



I took this image a few days after setup. The hygros and floating wisteria had been in the old 26. Please note how many leaves they had. Within a few weeks, the hygros lost their old leaves but I'm certain it was due to it being exposed to the air for a while prior to replanting. I have read it can be common. Sadly it hasn't looked as healthy as day 1. I eventually tossed out the floating wisteria which was previously in the 26 because it looked quite ill after some time.



This wisteria was bought new. It is still in the tank and has had continuous growth, but the lower leaves always die off, which wasn't a problem before.



This is a current image. As you can see, the wisteria and hygros bottom leaves always die off. The wisteria are in the right corner. The anubius plants have done well, although a few weeks ago they had nasty algae growing. The swords have done ok as well.


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## Boredomb (Feb 21, 2011)

It may be a lack of nutrients since you have more light now then before. The fertilizer you are using doesn't have all the nutrients needed for the plants. If you can get flourish comprehensive or Brightwells Aquatic Florinmulti I would use one of those as they are a well balanced fertilizer.


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## edman2012 (Mar 26, 2013)

Thanks for the advise. I think I'm actually going to wait on replacing the lights, to see if the plants do better with half the output. I probably have too much light, but I don't want to invest too much in adding more nutrients to get in balance. I will try flourish though, hopefully it helps.


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## Boredomb (Feb 21, 2011)

With flourish you can dose the correct amount (1mL per ever 12 gallons of water) once or twice a week.


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## jpbotha (Dec 9, 2008)

I've added a CO2 system to my planted tank. You will not believe the difference. I have to trim my plants at least once a week otherwise they grow out of the tank. I also use comprehensive flourish as nutrients and some Seachem Excel for the algae if required. I don't think you can ever have too much light with a planted tank. 
What substrate do you have on your tank? I'm using ADA Amazonia which works brilliantly but a bit expensive


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## Boredomb (Feb 21, 2011)

There is a balance you have to maintain with lights and nutrients (Co2 falls into that) or you can have issues with algae. This can be different from one tank to another due to many factors.


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