Dying Floating Plants

[Thursday Postal]

So, hello everyone.

I have an 8 gallon biocube which I bought because of a deal and it seemed that having everything inside it, the lights and the filter all together, was nice. I kind of regret it now and wish I had just gotten a normal tank (as this one has plastic sides which get scratched, the small size, the predetermined layout, etc)

This is the first aquarium I've had since I was a child, so really, the first aquarium I am taking care of on my own. I am interested in putting shrimp in it, red cherry shrimp, which I hope to buy soon. I've had the tank for a few months now, about three, and I believe it's cycled and everything. The only animal I have put into it was a malaysian trumpet snail (which is now several) and they seem to be doing fine. I put some plants in there from petsmart, but I made the new mistake of buying the ones in tubes, which I have learned are not aquarium plants at all. There are now an aponogeton bulb and a water onion bulb, the only two to sprout out of three packs of those dried bulbs.

That's just a breif history of my tank.

I went to my local fish store a couple weeks ago and got some duckweed for free, because I liked how it looked and liked floating plants. I thought it was charming. So I put that in and it seemed to grow and reproduce.. for about a week. A big patch of it started dying near the filter side of the tank. There was a strange white substance around the roots, probably due to decaying roots, and the leaves were clear and whitish, not yellow. I scooped out a bit of it, including some healthy plants in case it was infectious. A few days later, all of the plants (or a large portion, but mixed in with the good) were looking the same way. I scooped it all out and tried to figure out what was up, but I guessed it was just some kind of incompatability with my tank and the lfs tank.

Now, I bought some red root floater plants from a user on here (Right now saying I doubt that this has anything to do at all with his aquarium ability) probably against better judgement, but they weren't expensive and if they did grow I'd be happy with them. They were doing fine for almost a week, sprouting new leaves, all of them. Then I look in this morning, and same symptoms as the duckweed. A small clump near the filter looking clear and sickly. I stirred up the plants, so I could see if it's something with the filter. When I come home from work or tomorrow morning, the plants should look sickly by the filter. I should have taken a picture, but I will tonight if I can get an obvious patch.

I do not know what the problem is, is it possibly a lack of nutrients? In which case, I am willing to just forget about floating plants entirely. If it is a problem with my water, I would like to figure it out before putting shrimp in. If it is a problem with lighting, I would like to fix it, but the nature of the biocube would probably make this difficult. If it is indeed a problem with the filter, maybe I should look into that as well, but again..biocube.

Anyway, sorry for the long-winded post, and thank you for your help.

[cellodaisy]

Those little kits usually don't have enough light to really grow plants. Maybe that's the problem?

[ct-death]

-- From: http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Fertilizer/nutrient-deficiency.html (http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Fertilizer/nutrient-deficiency.html)

(*) The plants may also become reddish from the presence of the red pigment anthocyanin. (**) Although Jacobsen does not differentiate between new and old leaves, David Whittacker reports from a hydoponics book that boron, calcium, copper, iron, manganese and sulfur are immobile elements and whose deficiencies affect new leaves.

[bettabrat]

What is the "flow" like in your tank? Duckweed and a lot of floating plants like the waters surface to be fairly still. My duckweed doesn't do well near the filter or bubbler but flourishes in patches here and there on the top of the surface where it's nearly completely still.

[jpappy789]

I believe the biocubes come with pretty strong lighting as they are mainly intended for SW nano setups. Duckweed doesn't need much in terms of nutrients but it could be a possibility.

[DarrylR]

Don't worry.... just like me I kill duckweed and frogbit even though they said it populates like wildfire.

[srcfx]

Are you using a UV filter? I found that Hornwart won't live for long with my UV filter running.

[Thursday Postal]

Thanks for the responses. No, I'm not using a UV filter, and my surface water is fairly still, I moved the head so that it didn't push the surface too much, I've noticed I have a oily layer on top (probably from my skin when handling things), and the plants closest to the filter output were fine, it was the input ones dying. It's probably a lack of nutrients.. I don't put much into the tank as there is enough algae for the snails to eat and I have nothing else to feed, so there probably isn't much of anything for the floaters to draw out of the water. Considering I got enough of them to cover the whole top of the aquarium, it's probably too much, so they're all getting sickly. I'm going to try and take out most of it and find the healthiest looking ones and leave them inside. Maybe it's just too much for my tank.

In the attached picture you can see some of the worst of the plants, as well as the oil on top.

[Preeths]

Low lighting may be the culprit. If the leaves look bleached of color and turning white then it definitely is due to low lighting.

[bettabrat]

Hmm I don't know if the oil from your hands has anything to do with it or not. I have that in my tanks I try to best scoop it away when I do WC's. Other than surface movement and lighting I can't think of whatelse might be causing it. It could be lack of nutrients. Are you feeding the tank, & what are the other tank inhabitants if any?

[Squawkbert]

1) oily layer must be addressed - it's protein and scum, better circulation of water should help

2) investigate the lightbulb that came w/ the biocube - if it's for corals (quite blue, 10,000-14,000K rating), it won't do much for plants (who prefer 6500-10,000K, generally).

[Thursday Postal]

1) oily layer must be addressed - it's protein and scum, better circulation of water should help

2) investigate the lightbulb that came w/ the biocube - if it's for corals (quite blue, 10,000-14,000K rating), it won't do much for plants (who prefer 6500-10,000K, generally).

Yeah, I've adjusted the filter output for now, it'll take care of the layer. The biocube comes with two lights, one is white, the other is pretty blue. I use them both, generally.

As of now I've got the majority of the plants outside in a bowl of dechlorinated water. with a couple of algae wafers. I don't know if that really counts as nutrients for them (both my other plants come in bulb/bulblike forms so I'm sure that's why they're doing well), but I'm not willing to put much more into my tank than necessary because I'm much more interested in shrimp than floating plants. I'm just kind of experimenting at this point. The bowl is in good sunlight so I'm seeing if that'll help them any. If so, I'll see if I can get some better lighting without messing up other things.

[Thursday Postal]

Are you feeding the tank, & what are the other tank inhabitants if any?

It's probably either nutrients or lighting at this point. There isn't much going on in my tank right now because it's just the malaysian trumpet snails, and I give them bits of algae wafer if it looks like they have nothing to eat. I don't want to feed them too much though, so the water is probably pretty empty of anything. I'm not quite sure what aquarium plants need (other than co2/light/water, which aquarium plants get plenty of, and I figure as a surface plant the red root floaters get a decent amount of co2).

[Thursday Postal]

Update, for those who may search this thread with a similar problem in the future:

Outdoor plants are probably all dead. Maybe one or two will survive, who knows. Indoor plants: I have two or three left in the tank, one looks healthy, other two look very sickly, but they all are growing new little leaves, so maybe I just need to try and let the plant population grow on its own and find a balance. There are also a few duckweed plants here and there that came with the floaters that seem to be fine.