Bucephalandra + Marsilea hard melt

[SpiderManBearPig]

Bucephalandra "Blue green" and "deep purple" in vitro all melted progressively, now I'm left with rhizomes (almost no green left, all brownish). I've read that since they're grown emersed it's normal, but the thing is they looked beautiful and had new growth for the first two-three weeks, then one by one they turned brown/greyish and all leaves melted.
Now my marsilea is also melting patch by patch, no idea why...
They both had some long stringy gray hair, kind of like green hair algae, but grey/brown/dusty

Tank was cycled for 1.5 month before adding them.
tank : 60p with RO/DI water, with dennerle reminerals GH+
hardscape : seiryu stones
soil : ADA amazonia
filtration : Eheim pro4+ 350
light : chihiros wrgb 2 at 40% for 8 hours
ferts : liquid MACRO -> Nitrate, Phosphate and Potassium.
MICRO -> (Fe-HEEDTA, Mn, Cu, Zn, B, Mo) of green-aqua dosed at
1ml each every day
GH : 14
KH : 7
PH : 7.1
O2 : 10+ ppm
NH4 : <0.05 ppm
NO2 : <0.02 ppm
NO3 : <0.5 ppm
FE : 0.05 ppm
CO2 : solid green during the day
temp : 23° C

Can they bounce back ?
Is it normal or have I done something wrong in the process ?
Any input would be greatly appreciated !

Planting day :


10 days ago, melting started

Today (every bucephalandra melted, rhizomes are greyish)

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

soil : ADA amazonia

I'd guess you are still having some <"ammonia leaching"> from the ADA Amazonia.

cheers Darrel

 

[Andy Pierce]

Pretty nasty stuff and you have my sympathy - it doesn't sound to me like you did anything wrong as such. I doubt the bucephalandra are going to rally from this. The marsilea will do a transition from emersed form to submersed growth, so 'melting' is normal to an extent. It's important in that regard to determine whether it is only the emersed-form leaves that are melting, or whether you also see melting in newly grown submersed form leaves. If it's only the emersed form, you can trim those off / clean up as they melt to keep them from rotting in the tank and wait for the new growth to come in. How long that takes can vary a lot, could be as soon as immediately or as long as 6 weeks depending on plant and conditions. How would you say your floating plants are doing?

 

[SpiderManBearPig]

hey lads, thanks for your inputs !

I'd guess you are still having some <"ammonia leaching"> from the ADA Amazonia.

Even after 2.5 months ? I didn't take that into account, thought it'd stop being a factor when the cycling is fully done.

I doubt the bucephalandra are going to rally from this.

Well... RIP I guess... If I was to try buce again, would you advise that I wait 6 months + for the tank to be fully stable ?

it is only the emersed-form leaves that are melting, or whether you also see melting in newly grown

That's what surprised me, nothing melted at first, a lot of new very healthy leaves, and now it looks like couple of leaves start melting and it spreads to the entire patch...

would you say your floating plants are doing?

Extremely well, they overran the tank in two weeks and I had to remove a lot, why do you ask ? Could it be that they sucked away nutrients, depriving the rest ?

 

[MirandaB]

Don't give up on the Buce,so long as the bits of rhizome are still firm they will come back,it'll just take time....I've melted Buce right back before and it wasn't a problem 🙂
You're not dosing any easycarbo/excel are you?

 

[SpiderManBearPig]

Don't give up on the Buce,so long as the bits of rhizome are still firm they will come back,it'll just take time....I've melted Buce right back before and it wasn't a problem 🙂
You're not dosing any easycarbo/excel are you?

Rhizomes are turning from green to brown/grey as well unfortunately... I'm leaving them in the tank as long as there is hope 🙂
I am not using those no, I read in a couple articles that liquid carbon products are actually toxic and do not provide much, apparently they're sort of a scam (?) so I stopped using them. (It was from a scientific paper so it seemed legitimate and well documented ) What's your experience with those ? 🙂

 

[MirandaB]

I'd still leave them and see if they come back,Buce are really quite resilient plants.
I personally don't use any glute based products in any tanks with livestock in and the reason I mentioned it was I wondered if perhaps you'd "burnt" the plants adding it into the water flow.

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

mentioned it was I wondered if perhaps you'd "burnt" the plants adding it into the water flow.

Even after 2.5 months ? I didn't take that into account, thought it'd stop being a factor when the cycling is fully done.

It looks like fertiliser burn, which is why I suggested it may be ammonia burn, but glutaraldehyde would also cause those symptoms. How did you measure how far your cycle had got?

cheers Darrel

 

[SpiderManBearPig]

It looks like fertiliser burn, which is why I suggested it may be ammonia burn, but glutaraldehyde would also cause those symptoms. How did you measure how far your cycle had got?

I checked for NO2 and NO3 traces every week, when NO2 was close to zero and NO3 was high it seemed to me it was good enough, that took 1.5 month. I
still waited two weeks after that just to be sure and then did water changes to lower GH/KH that were very high (GH~22/KH~14).
I did a black start, don't know if it'd matter ?
I also started the light strength at 30% then moved to 35 after two weeks then 40% after two more weeks, can that be part of the problem too ?

 

[erwin123]

Don't give up on the Buce,so long as the bits of rhizome are still firm they will come back,it'll just take time....I've melted Buce right back before and it wasn't a problem 🙂
You're not dosing any easycarbo/excel are you?

I think this is the problem with in vito Buce that has just been planted - the rhizomes may not be viable after all the leaves fall off - as pointed out they're also grey/brown rather than green.

 

[CMooner]

GH : 14
KH : 7

Are you remineralizing to this reading or is your hardscape leaching? If it's not, I would cut back to GH5, KH1-2 if given a choice.

 

[Matti]

What is Solid Green CO2? Some kind of glutaraldehyde, bad stuff. And your N-levels are almost zero, not good either.

 

[SpiderManBearPig]

I think this is the problem with in vito Buce that has just been planted - the rhizomes may not be viable after all the leaves fall off - as pointed out they're also grey/brown rather than green.

Yeah sadly rhizomes became mushy pale brown, so I think they're goners for good...
I have another tank, similar water parameters, been stable for around 2 years, would it be a good idea to first put the next batch of buce in that one for the acclimation, then move some of them to this tank ? Or is that dumb since they're going to have to go through acclimation twice ?

Are you remineralizing to this reading or is your hardscape leaching? If it's not, I would cut back to GH5, KH1-2 if given a choice.

I'm remineralizing to GH 7 more or less but the Seiryu stones are leaching I think, so it raises up then I put back RO/DI water after a week to cut it back. Could the fluctuating parameters impact planth health ?

What is Solid Green CO2? Some kind of glutaraldehyde, bad stuff. And your N-levels are almost zero, not good either.

I was talking about the drop checker which looks to be on the "good" green all day through.
For the N-levels, I aimed for that on purpose to get red rotalas (so far no luck, best I got was light green/yellow-ish) Do bucephalandras suffer from that ?

cheers for the help

 

[Gorillastomp]

For the N-levels, I aimed for that on purpose to get red rotalas (so far no luck, best I got was light green/yellow-ish)

To achieve this you need high light, NO3 at lower than 10 ppm (even 5ppm) but not near 0 and the right species like H'ra. If your buce couldn't root in the soil, they had pretty much nothing to live on since most of their nutrient comes from the water column.

 

[Simon Cole]

I read in a couple articles that liquid carbon products are actually toxic and do not provide much, apparently they're sort of a scam (?) so I stopped using them. (It was from a scientific paper so it seemed legitimate and well documented ) What's your experience with those ?

I tend to think that newly cycled tanks suffer from melt mainly because they have the wrong balance of microbial life and the plants become infected, but I also think oxygen levels have a lot to do with it. I agree with what other people have said about in-vitro. I have started bucephalandra in-vitro in humid conditions using a damp inert media with a pinch of Trichoderma T22 until they got dark green leaves and new roots, then bunged them into an established tank with high flow and low light to acclimatise for a month, before planting them permanently. I tend to look at it more along the lines of disease prevention. But don't take my word for it, it was a while back and there are many ways to cook an egg.