Hello all,
I am having the worst trouble with plants lately and I cannot figure out why. I'm hoping I can get some good direction from here.
I have a 55 gallon freshwater community (4 lady bettas, 6 h raspboras, 6 Cory cats, 1 albino bristle nose, 6 cherry barbs), gravel substrate, with 2 x Marineland penguin 200 HOBs. It's Florida so the water is softened, but pH 8.4. Ammonia and nitrites 0, nitrates usually hover around 5. Water is a good 78 degrees.
I use the beams work 6500K LED light (the 48" version, length of the tank). I dose the Aquarium Co-Op Easy Green (6 pumps daily) and 2 tsp of the Flourish comprehensive supplement twice weekly. This seems to get the plants to barely hang on, with very slow growth. The lights are on 6 hours per day. Any less and everything gets covered with the brown sheet algae, and much more and I get green algae.
The only plants that seem to be fine are my anubias nana, which I often have to cut and split because it won't stop growing. Ammania, dwarf chain sword, mayaca have barely clung to existence and seem to be losing the battle.
I also have an amazon sword that I'm pretty sure has bit the dust.
My two thoughts are the pH is too high, the lighting is too intense, or both. Our house gets lots of natural light but the tank doesn't get direct sunlight.
Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thank you!
I am having the worst trouble with plants lately and I cannot figure out why. I'm hoping I can get some good direction from here.
I have a 55 gallon freshwater community (4 lady bettas, 6 h raspboras, 6 Cory cats, 1 albino bristle nose, 6 cherry barbs), gravel substrate, with 2 x Marineland penguin 200 HOBs. It's Florida so the water is softened, but pH 8.4. Ammonia and nitrites 0, nitrates usually hover around 5. Water is a good 78 degrees.
I use the beams work 6500K LED light (the 48" version, length of the tank). I dose the Aquarium Co-Op Easy Green (6 pumps daily) and 2 tsp of the Flourish comprehensive supplement twice weekly. This seems to get the plants to barely hang on, with very slow growth. The lights are on 6 hours per day. Any less and everything gets covered with the brown sheet algae, and much more and I get green algae.
The only plants that seem to be fine are my anubias nana, which I often have to cut and split because it won't stop growing. Ammania, dwarf chain sword, mayaca have barely clung to existence and seem to be losing the battle.
I also have an amazon sword that I'm pretty sure has bit the dust.
My two thoughts are the pH is too high, the lighting is too intense, or both. Our house gets lots of natural light but the tank doesn't get direct sunlight.
Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thank you!