Can you help me to improve the health on my Java Fern?

[davidao25]

Hello

I have this java plant on my tank for almost a year. Bought it already attatched to wood which is hidden under the gravel. PROBLEM IS that the older leaves are always getting those brown patches making it uggly. I change 40% water every 3 weeks and always aspirating/vacuum the bottom with the proper tube. I don't use any chemicals apart from the clorine neutralizer at the recommended dose. Temperature is 23C. Fish are one Otocinculus, one Coydora and a Guppy. The light is a 40w incandescent spotlight with a difuser (white painted). I have it on 7 hours/day. Leaves rarely die and feel hard to touch.

Any sujestions?:huh:

Thank you
David

P.S. Air bubbles on leaves are because I've just changed water. I know that the round spots on the left large leave is related to reproduction of the plant.

 

[RazzleFish]

I voted blabla! Haha!

Welcome to AC!

It looks like the rhizome (Horizontal stem where leaves and roots attach) of the plant is burried in the gravel. If this is the case the plant will surely die. This plant should be attached to driftwood or rocks with the rhizome above the gravel.

Incandescent bulbs do not provide proper light to grow plants. In this situation you can either replace the fixture with a fluorescent one or replace the bulb with a compact fluorescent bulb.

Hope that helps!
Razz

 

[Jspigs]

I voted blabla! Haha!

Welcome to AC!

It looks like the rhizome (Horizontal stem where leaves and roots attach) of the plant is burried in the gravel. If this is the case the plant will surely die. This plant should be attached to driftwood or rocks with the rhizome above the gravel.

Incandescent bulbs do not provide proper light to grow plants. In this situation you can either replace the fixture with a fluorescent one or replace the bulb with a compact fluorescent bulb.

Hope that helps!
Razz

:iagree: With all of this, especially about the rhizome.

 

[Vince G.]

My Java Fern started doing much better once I attached it to wood and got the entire plant above the gravel. I've read somewhere that they are like anubis....the light needs to hit the rhizome in order to make the plant happy.

 

[Mgamer20o0]

I voted blabla! Haha!

Welcome to AC!

It looks like the rhizome (Horizontal stem where leaves and roots attach) of the plant is burried in the gravel. If this is the case the plant will surely die. This plant should be attached to driftwood or rocks with the rhizome above the gravel.

Incandescent bulbs do not provide proper light to grow plants. In this situation you can either replace the fixture with a fluorescent one or replace the bulb with a compact fluorescent bulb.

Hope that helps!
Razz

100% right on.

 

[davidao25]

Changes based on members advice.

Hello

Thank you RazzleFish for the explanation and the others for confirming it. I've made some changes now. Got the plant out and cut off all of the bad leaves in a way to have enough room for new leaves to grow, specially in the middle. Placed the plant back (it is on driftwood) and the rhizomes are now exposed to light. I've also covered the RH Side of the tank with cardboard cause I've noticed the leaves were seeking the light coming from the window making the plant irregular as a whole. I'll monitor the plant evolution and update the thread with photos in a month or so.
After that and to determine which of the two factors (buried rhizomes and incandescent light) would have more impact on the leaves health I will also change the bulb to a daylight (6400k) but need to find one with a similar shape or it won't fit my DIY setup that you can see now on the photo below. No it's not dangerous as there's no condensation on the bulb fitting cause the water vapour raises trough the grill.
Please let me know if there's something else I should have done or did wrong.:duh:

Regards
David :newbie:

 

[CoryWM]

The change you've made are good. In my opinion the reason you're not experiencing the growth you're seeking is lack of nutrients. That low fish load cannot produce enough waste to keep it healthy. Especially when you're doing water changes every 3 weeks. I would only do water changes when nitrates hit 40ppm. I think you will find that they never hit that because the plant is consuming them faster than you make it in that setup.

If you wanted to continue your water change schedule, I'd suggest adding a few more fish.

 

[davidao25]

Hi CoryWM and thanks for your comments.

Yes, that makes a lot of sense.
The fish in the tank (Guppy - Corydoras - Otocyculus) were planed in a way to reduce waste as much as possible. I feed them with flakes and dry bloodworms.
So Guppy eats floating food > Corydoras eats what falls to the bottom > plant eats waste. The Otocyculus eats the algae keeping plant and tank clean. So maybe this setup is working too well and the plant can't get enough food. Hummm, one more factor to consider. This is getting tricky!

Doing a nitrate test at this stage won't help much since I've removed about 60% of leaves and the plant will not be so hungry now (I think???) so that factor would probably raise the nitrates levels.

I'll get one of those 6 in one test strips and do proper testing in about a month time (won't change water till then).

One day I'll get to the bottom of this...

 

[nonamesleft47]

Voted bla myself. I have a java fern that does exactly the same thing. It is attached to rocks in an african cichlid tank, lighting is low/mod (2 t8 bulbs over a 75 gallon tank). Java fern grows as does anubias however the java fern gets brown spots on the leaves and then they drop off after turning brown. I've tried everything from changing light bulbs to stopping water changes to see if the increase in nitrates helps, no change. I'm now experimenting dosing with iron to see if that helps.

 

[Fyurae]

This is a helpful diagram (scroll down a bit).