Eco complete and water changes, dead plants

kalabreeze

kalabreeze

AC Members
Sep 11, 2008
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USA
Hi guys, it has been a while since I posted here last time. I have a pretty sad situation here. I started new aquarium with eco-complete back in spring. It was first time that I used this particular substrate. Plants were doing great, I was amazed, quite a change, I was only using simple gravel before.
About a month later I did water change, vacuumed the bottom and my plants started dying. Now I am left only with lobellia cardinalis small form, java fern, anubias and subwassertang. All my stem plants are gone. It all happened pretty fast and all I did was vaccumed substrate. Did I pull out some important nutritients? Water in the bucket was very brown. Do you vacuum your eco?
Everything before water change was great, previous water changes without gravel vac were fine. I had sufficient lighting, dosing ferts, etc.
 
Few questions
1. Tank size
2. Ammount of ligth? Photoperiod time? kind of bulbs?
3. WC frecuency
4. Water temp
5. Ferts dosis and kind of ferts
6. What kind of plants do you have?
 
From my experience, I try not to vaccum my eco, and if i do, i just skim the top. (instead of sticking it in like with grave)
 
NorCalFish said:
From my experience, I try not to vaccum my eco, and if i do, i just skim the top. (instead of sticking it in like with grave)
Click to expand...

+1, maybe you are broken or disturbing the roots
 
I skim the top also. If you're paranoid of gas build up in the substrate, poke around with a small stick, which probably doesn't disturb the plants much compared to digging around with a gravel vac.
 
Try adding root tabs. The substrate will eventually need more nutrients added. I wouldn't vacuum that substrate either.
 
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