Micronutrient toxicity.. or deficiency.. ? Pls help.

[rusticdr]

I know what a lot of u must be thinking. I have read all those discussions on this topic and there r a lot of people who don't believe that micronutrients toxicity can happen. Well... I am no expert and I have not measured the micros in my tank. However the way that things have unfolded in my tank compel me to believe that it cud be micronutrient toxicity. This is my story:
Tank spec: (started In June 2016)
100 g 48x24x21
T5ho 54w x 4 (2 6500k, 1 10000k, 1 4000k)
Initially 7 hrs of which all 4 only for 2 hrs
Now 6 hrs of which only 1 hr all 4 .. with 1.5
hr siesta inbetween when c02 will still be on
Co2 through inline reactor 2 hrs before light and off 1 hr before @ 3bps
Drop checker was green
Substrate Ada Amazonia and contro
Filters: eheim 2217 and sunsun 303b
Wavemaker x 2 800gph

Ferts:
Now initially I was doing full EI in RO water:
Macro: kno3 x 12 tsp
Kh2po4 x 4 tsp
Mgso4 x 20 tsp
Dissolved in 600 ml of water
Dosed 50 ml on alternate days
Micro:
Seachem flourish 8 ml
Seachem iron 5 ml
Both on alternate days
Temp of tank 28 to 29 with two 6 in 1 cooling fans
Weekly 50% water change without fail with 8 tsp of seachem equilibrium with each change
Filters cleaned once every 3 months

Plants:
Hygrophila difformis
H. Polysperma
Crypt. Wendetti.
Crypt. Spiralis
Luwigia ovalis
Rotala rotundifolia hi red
R. Indica
L. Aromatica
Anubias nana
Korymbosa compacta
L. Aquatica
Micro. Hemianthicus
Flame moss
Christmas moss
Frogbits

Fauna:
8x congo tetra
15x neon tetra
6x cardinals
4x bosemani rainbow
10x hengeli rasbora
7x asian rummy nose
3x rummy nose
3x pencil fish beckford
7x corys
3x bn pleco
4x otos
2x black molly
1x sae
1x German blue ram
1x angel fish
1x female neon gaurami
6x amano shrimp

Fed once a day.. hikari micropellets, microwafers and frozen worms on subsequent days.

The initial 6 months after setting up the tank was bliss without ferts with the Ada Amazonia working and plants were growing just great. Trimming was so often. Then.. once I took over ei.. the rotala rotundifolia which was the fastest growing completely burnt out.. it lost its leaves and became Brown. Similarly I lost l. Aromatica and h. Polysperma, which is actually a weed, started breaking off. When i checked, my nitrates and phosphates were》160 and 》 10 ppm resp. I did multiple water changes. Then I reduced my ei by half but continued same micro dose. Some plants were doing ok but others not so. Stem plants were mostly not doing great. Twice burnt rotala and melted the Ech. Major and l. aromatica. Had green hair algae too. Then I started getting the deficiency symptoms..
Stunted small leaves in stems
Curling and malformed leaves
Holes with yellow edges
Dark leaves
Leaves breaking off early
Getting absorbed from the periphery

Co2 deficiency was the first thought in my mind but the thing was that one of the plants affected was my frogbits too which s exposed to air. So I started dosing k2so4 x 4 tsp into a separate 600 ml bottle. My nitrates were at this time hovering at 40 ppm and phosphates 3 ppm. My water became hard dgh of 14. So I stopped equilibrium. There was no improvement. Most of my plants would shoot of new leaves which wud look ok but the old leaves will have holes and break off as the nutrients were being hauled off from them. I had upped my co2 to 6 bps for over 2 months as I read that co2 def can also present like this.
All this while I never reduced my micros. Then I started reading abt micro tox. Then I noticed that after a water change my plants wud pearl so much on the first day after which it wud reduce. So what I did was do twice weekly water changes with only macros for fertilization. So if it were micronutrient toxicity things should have improved.. but sadly it just persists. Nearly all the frogbits have dissappeared. I even reduced lights to only 54x2 for 6 hrs with a 1.5 hr siesta. But even though the plants aren't dying they shoot new leaves but the older leaves definitely show deficiency symptoms. L. aromatica shows small malformed leaves.

Can anyone explain what s going on..
1. If it's co2 I have increased bps to 6 and cleaned the reactor. And why have frogbits been affected (duckweed index)
2. Potassium def.. have been adding kno3 and kh2po4 from the beginning and now supplemented with k2s04.. any more I might cross into toxic levels.
3. Calcium def.. have been dosing two teaspoons of equilibrium last 10 days even though water shows 13 dgh. No improvement.
4. Micro nutrient def.. have been dosing flourish regularly but it's been 5ml twice weekly when the actual recommended dose is 8 ml once or twice weekly.
5. Micro nutrient tox.. could explain signs of potassium and calcium deficiency and also burning up of frogbits. But why no improvement after several water changes.

Attaching pics.

1. Initial phase without ferts.
2. After starting ferts

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[rusticdr]

3. Burnt plants
4. Post overdose recovery

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[rusticdr]

Loss of l. aromatica but notice the healthy l. aquatica. This was before the recent failure.

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[rusticdr]

Recent pics. Before multiple water changes.
U can notice that the older leaves have been robbed off nutrients and look unhealthy.

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[rusticdr]

These were taken yesterday. The l. aromatica has such small deformed leaves. Never seen this plant behave this way before. Frogbits almost gone. L. Ovalis showing def symptoms in older leaves as are rotala indica. Pls give ur valuable feedback.

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[dw1305]

Hi all,
You can tell that it isn't a CO2 problem, because it is happening to your Frogbit as well, which has access to 400pppm CO2.

It is likely to be iron deficiency. Problems with micro-nutrients are usually to do with availability, which can be dependent upon the concentrations of the other ions present in the water.

If you ever get those really white tips to the leaves, that is a non-mobile element, and iron is the most likely
(particularly in hard water). When you add plant available iron, you won't get an instant greening, because the plant can't move it to the older leaves, but the new leaves should be healthy.

You could try a different iron source, Seachem use "ferrous" gluconate which is more likely to precipitate out of solution then chelated iron.

Have a look at <"Iron deficiency?"> and linked posts.

cheers Darrel

 

[ceg4048]

Well, I mean, is it possible that you have more than one problem? That frogbit has one problem and that the submerged plants have a different problem?
Where is it written that a tank can oly have one problem?
I can see immediately that the stem plant in the very last photo has GSA, which is caused by any combination of poor CO2 + poor PO4.

The other symptoms described are of classic CO2 shortfall.

Could it be possible that the plants grew so much that they strangled themselves by blocking flow/distribution?
Could it be that there is so much plant mass that they now require a lot more CO2 yet the CO2 is attenuated?

Instead of letting everything grow wild you can keep things trimmed and neat to encourage better flow/distribution.

You can also remove some of the filter media to get a better flow rate to support the higher mass.

When plants are fed more nutrients they consume and demand more CO2.
When plants are fed CO2 they consume and demand more nutrients.
The more CO2 a plant becomes, the less efficiently it is of actually consuming CO2
The more nutrients a plant is fed the less efficiently it can uptake nutrients.

I see no toxicity issue here. Better tank maintenance and infrastructure will solve this riddle.

Cheers,

 

[Zak Rafik]

Instead of letting everything grow wild you can keep things trimmed and neat to encourage better flow/distribution.

Hi Ceg,🙂
But what if the OP wants a jungle style scape or maintain dense growth? What would you recommend?
I have seen several tanks where the plant growth is so dense that the substrate nor the tank's back glass can be seen and yet have luxurious growth.
Can this be due to the tank having very good flow and this in turn transports nutrients and co2 all the the tank with no dead spots?

When plants are fed more nutrients they consume and demand more CO2.
When plants are fed CO2 they consume and demand more nutrients.
The more CO2 a plant becomes, the less efficiently it is of actually consuming CO2
The more nutrients a plant is fed the less efficiently it can uptake nutrients.

What about lights? Isn't light the main driving force in nutrient and Co2 uptake rate?


Still learning.😉
Cheers.

 

[rusticdr]

Hi all,
You can tell that it isn't a CO2 problem, because it is happening to your Frogbit as well, which has access to 400pppm CO2.

It is likely to be iron deficiency. Problems with micro-nutrients are usually to do with availability, which can be dependent upon the concentrations of the other ions present in the water.

If you ever get those really white tips to the leaves, that is a non-mobile element, and iron is the most likely
(particularly in hard water). When you add plant available iron, you won't get an instant greening, because the plant can't move it to the older leaves, but the new leaves should be healthy. You could try a different iron source, Seachem use "ferrous" gluconate which is more likely to precipitate out of solution then chelated iron.

Have a look at <"Iron deficiency?"> and linked posts.

cheers Darrel

Thanks for ur reply. The thing with iron is that I have been dosing with seachem iron since the very beginning and the dose has been very even. Just 5 ml once per week. But as u can c from previous pictures I haven't had this sort of plant morphology before. True that I have burnt up some plants.. but that time I was overdosing nitrates and phosphates. Even if it's iron wat abt other features like the holes in the leaves which r not described in iron deficiency. Sorry for questioning your line of thought. Just like to be clear. That s all.

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[rusticdr]

Well, I mean, is it possible that you have more than one problem? That frogbit has one problem and that the submerged plants have a different problem?
Where is it written that a tank can oly have one problem?
I can see immediately that the stem plant in the very last photo has GSA, which is caused by any combination of poor CO2 + poor PO4.

The other symptoms described are of classic CO2 shortfall.

Could it be possible that the plants grew so much that they strangled themselves by blocking flow/distribution?
Could it be that there is so much plant mass that they now require a lot more CO2 yet the CO2 is attenuated?

Instead of letting everything grow wild you can keep things trimmed and neat to encourage better flow/distribution.

You can also remove some of the filter media to get a better flow rate to support the higher mass.

When plants are fed more nutrients they consume and demand more CO2.
When plants are fed CO2 they consume and demand more nutrients.
The more CO2 a plant becomes, the less efficiently it is of actually consuming CO2
The more nutrients a plant is fed the less efficiently it can uptake nutrients.

I see no toxicity issue here. Better tank maintenance and infrastructure will solve this riddle.

Cheers,

Thanks for ur reply..
I am a fan of urs and of course Tom Barr. So my first and foremost thought was poor co2 and poor circulation. So I increased co2 from 2 to almost 6 bps. I checked the tube for kinks and leaks. Also cleaned the inline reactor. I also added an extra 800 gph wavemaker and a powerhead in the back. The flow around the tank is excellent so much so that u cannot find any debris on the substrate.. if i increase flow any more the tank Will look like a whirlpool. I do know that it's densely planted but that's how it has been from the very beginning. I like it that way. And in the beginning co2 was only at 2 bps. Plants were not having these issues. And abt frogbits.. let us assume they have a different issue.. we then agree it s not co2. But then it must be nutrient related one. If a nutrient problem has markedly affected the frogbits why not the same be attributed to the other plants. Having reduced my lighting intensity a bit has slowed down the downturn a bit. So I guess light s a very important factor in driving the needs of plants.

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[Konsa]

Hi
I had simmular issue with my floating plants in the past.I was going all over the place with thoughts what could be the issue.
It turned out that my high flow was bashing them too hard arround and once leaves underwater they just rot away slowly.Now I managed to fix them in certain areas and they grow just awesome.
Regards Konsa

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,

I had simmular issue with my floating plants in the past.I was going all over the place with thoughts what could be the issue.
It turned out that my high flow was bashing them too hard arround and once leaves underwater they just rot away slowly.Now I managed to fix them in certain areas and they grow just awesome.

It is a good point, they don't enjoy being bashed around.

Even if it's iron wat abt other features like the holes in the leaves which r not described in iron deficiency.

I'm not sure about what's in the aquarium based literature, but there is scientific research that shows that you get holes in the leaves with iron deficiency, in Lemna it is one of the first signs of low iron levels. The marks are described as <"snake bite lesions"> (from the link, in fig. 2. "long description").

.........Photograph C is a close-up of three or four plants. The photo is illustrating “snake-bite” lesions on the fronds that are resultant from long-term iron deficiency. The lesions are small and appear as two white dots which are side by each on the otherwise green fronds......

If you look at the tips of your plants (below) they are severely chlorotic and stunted, so it has to be a deficiency of a non-mobile nutrient (the plant can't move it to the new leaves), and one that causes <"chlorosis">.



The non-mobile <"plant nutrients"> are listed in <"Michigan State- Knowing plant....">, and iron (Fe) and manganese (Mn), are the two most likely, and are both involved in chlorophyll synthesis.

I would be very, very surprised if it isn't an iron deficiency.

cheers Darrel

 

[Daveslaney]

Agree with darrel.
I would try chelated iron along side the seachem iron. I remember reading somewhere about ferrious gluetanate although a good source of iron being very KH dependent and can become unavailable to the plants at diff KH values.
Think this is the reason most micro mixes that use it use chelated iron along side.

 

[rusticdr]

Hi
I had simmular issue with my floating plants in the past.I was going all over the place with thoughts what could be the issue.
It turned out that my high flow was bashing them too hard arround and once leaves underwater they just rot away slowly.Now I managed to fix them in certain areas and they grow just awesome.
Regards Konsa

I read abt that too. Actually even though there s strong flow in my tank water surface does not break. And the frogbits get segregated in one corner by my fish feeding rings. So they r stationary. Anyway thanks for ur comment.

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[Konsa]

I read abt that too. Actually even though there s strong flow in my tank water surface does not break. And the frogbits get segregated in one corner by my fish feeding rings. So they r stationary. Anyway thanks for ur comment.

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Hi
It may be that sagregation and the constant pressure that is pushing them tight together forsing them to push eachother leaves underwater. On the pics the leaves that are rotting are bent down and well submerged Once that happens is enevitable for the leaves to rot away.I had that in my tanks too.
Regards Konsa

 

[ceg4048]

But what if the OP wants a jungle style scape or maintain dense growth? What would you recommend?
I have seen several tanks where the plant growth is so dense that the substrate nor the tank's back glass can be seen and yet have luxurious growth.

Will look like a whirlpool. I do know that it's densely planted but that's how it has been from the very beginning. I like it that way. And in the beginning co2 was only at 2 bps. Plants were not having these issues

Yes, I've had jungle tanks myself, and of course suffered exactly the same problem - until I solved the flow/distribution riddle in that particular tank.
I don't know if a whirlpool is necessarily the best flow pattern. Since I cannot see the tank it is difficult to analyze or suggest how to arrange the various nozzles for best effect.

There is too much evidence against the theory of nutrient toxicity. You yourself have the evidence.
You stated that you were using ADA Amazonia correct? Well did you realize that brand new ADA Amazonia contains approximately 100X EI values of nutrients?
So you were dosing 100X EI in the substrate and your plants grew fine. Then you dose 1X EI in the water column and the plants didn't do fine and so you assumed that 1X EI dosing is toxic but 100X EI is OK? No, sorry, I cannot accept that.

I can see your L. aromatica suffers poor color and has a slight case of hair algae.

Here is my L. aromatica dosed for 2 years at 5X EI. So clearly, nutrient toxicity cannot be blamed for poor performance.


Just having high flow is not enough. The flow must be distributed properly. Despite your assumption that you have good flow/distribution, it's my contention that you have a distribution problem.

Perhaps if you can show us video or photos of your pump configuration we might be able to troubleshoot.

Cheers,

 

[Daveslaney]

Fantastic plants Clive.

 

[rusticdr]

Hi
It may be that sagregation and the constant pressure that is pushing them tight together forsing them to push eachother leaves underwater.

Thanks. I think u do have a point. I will have a look at that and get back to u. Just have a couple of them left from what used to be 50 or so. Pretty sad.

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[ceg4048]

I went back to the images to study them more closely to see if it's possible to change some things around.
As you may know, my standard technique is to use a spraybars across the length of the back wall and to point them forward. It's my belief that this is the best starting point and that if supplementary pumps are added then they should be place in a location that best augments the flow pattern created by the spraybars.

What I see in those first images with the pump placement, I must say that I disagree with the placement, but, maybe they were OK for a while until the going got rough, when things got a bit thicker (more dense foliage).

I can just make out one green spraybar in image #2 but it looks crooked and I cannot see if it extends all the way across the back.

It also appears that you have two Koralias pointing in opposite direction, one at the front left and the other at the rear right. This is never a good arrangement because each pump actually cancels the flow of the other. All pumps are most effective when they all push together in the same direction. It's not clear to me what vision you had in mind with this particular pump arrangement. Again, you might have gotten away with this with a lighter plant mass, but as the mass increases, I believe it becomes less effective.

Cheers,

 

[rusticdr]

Yes, I've had jungle tanks myself, and of course suffered exactly the same problem - until I solved the flow/distribution riddle in that particular tank.
I don't know if a whirlpool is necessarily the best flow pattern. Since I cannot see the tank it is difficult to analyze or suggest how to arrange the various nozzles for best effect.

Not saying I have a whirlpool or need one. Just saying that there s a lot of flow. But I get ur point.

There is too much evidence against the theory of nutrient toxicity. You yourself have the evidence.
You stated that you were using ADA Amazonia correct? Well did you realize that brand new ADA Amazonia contains approximately 100X EI values of nutrients?
So you were dosing 100X EI in the substrate and your plants grew fine. Then you dose 1X EI in the water column and the plants didn't do fine and so you assumed that 1X EI dosing is toxic but 100X EI is OK? No, sorry, I cannot accept that.

Yes. That's true. But I wasn't dosing micros in the beginning. Could that be the reason?

Just having high flow is not enough. The flow must be distributed properly. Despite your assumption that you have good flow/distribution, it's my contention that you have a distribution problem.

Perhaps if you can show us video or photos of your pump configuration we might be able to troubleshoot,

Yes. I could post some videos of the flow pattern. Btw that aromatica looks awesome. Pls don't mistake my arguments. Not trying to prove anything. Just trying to understand more abt what's happening. Thanks so much.

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