please help

[crabguy]

my sword plants are dying. doing pwc every week, 40-50 %. i also have wisteria which are not really growing either. have flourish tabs under the swords and using flourish excel. water parameters are good. even added some potassium (nu salt) as some one suggested. maybe too much phosphates? please help.

[djlen]

Reply with the size of tank, lighting, water parameters, fish, types of all plants etc.
This info. is important to help you out.
Lacking just one key element could be the cause of the problem.

Len

[crabguy]

i have a 52 gal flat back hex, coralife 2x65 watt lights, emperor 400. 2 swords and wisteria. water parameters are all within range, 0-ammonia, 0-nitrites, less tha 20-nitrates, ph-7.0. fish are: 1-cory, 1 pleco, 2-med angels, nine-assorted rainbows. the leaves on the swords are disintergating and the wisteria seems to have stop growing. i use to algae in the tank, but now it's minimal. however i did notice that on the outlets of the filter where the water flows back into the tank that there is now brown stuff. it use to be green algae. please help.

[djlen]

If the tank is an immature one the 'brown stuff' is probably diatoms. Should be soft and easy to remove. It will decrease as the tank matures and a bio-colony develops.

You have good light, and a light fish load, but enough fish to create excess nitrates unless you are doing a weekly water change. That is a very light plant mass from what you describe so I don't want to recommend over doing it with nutrients, but you really need to balance the N - nitrates with some P - Phosphates and some K - Potassium.
Read this: http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_fertilizer_intro.htm
It will give you a better handle on the macro nutrients and also trace elements that are necessary for plants to grow.
In short it sounds like you are starving the plants and they are not getting a balanced diet.
You will find more good info. in the stickies at the top of the Plant Page.

Len

[crabguy]

thanks djlen for the info. found another problem last nite. my tap water's nitrites are off the chart, using api test kit. did a 40% pwc on wed. check tank water last nite, nitrites were .25, usually it's zero. that's when i tested the tap water. i use amquel plus as a water conditioner and retested some spare water i keed after the pwc and the nitrites were .25 also. my nitrates were .20. also read on the amquel bottle that i can't use a nessler test kit for ammonia when using amquel, so what would be an alternate test product?

[TKOS]

How old are the swords to you? New swords will generally die back quite a bit as they are generally grown emersed. When left submerged for awhile the leaves die off and new leaves grow that are a bit different.