Sorry for the delay in responding… I appreciate everyone's suggestions and comments.... I apologize if I'm rambling
I do agree that water changes are useful and sometimes mandatory to reset a system that has higher accumulations of any number of substances… I guess I didn't mention that after the long dry start method where the plants grew massively, I did many 100% water changes to leech any remaining organics from the system but perhaps it wasn't enough… it was then that I stopped doing water changes as per the Tom Barr non co2 method like I've done many times before and everything was fine for a long time... but once the the riparium plants started to take off things changed but then again it might be just coincidence because of accumulation over time…
Riparium plant growth was exploding but the submerged growth was slowing in most but not all plants… but they didn't show signs of obvious deficiency so it was confusing me… the whole idea of a shallow wide riparium is that there CAN be equal lighting for submerged and riparium plants where the former isn't shaded by the latter… so as the riparium plants grow the lighting doesn't change under the water… so now I ask myself is there too much or not enough light?
the Hydrocotyle tripartita is 95% gone now and only growing above the water surface along the driftwood… the e. Tenellus in the brightest section has always done well but the e. Tenellus ‘green’ has suffered the most with the algae as well as the lilaeopsis mauritania… and the crypts under the brightest lights have melted where the crypts under the shadows have been just fine…
I have not altered the ferts since day one and I have been using the concentrations outlined by the non co2 method which has worked well before… if the riparium plants were taking it all wouldn't I see obvious signs of deficiency not just slow growth and algae? Why would the e. Tenellus be bright green and growing compact while other plants are covered in algae? What's happening just doesn't make sense to me in my experiences…
After manual removal and water changes and gravel vac things were looking better, but after returning from a trip I came home to a new kind of algae - brown filamentous diatoms! During the last water change I drained too much of the display tank and while filling it back up I stirred up the safe t sorb in the back which may have added too much silicates into the water column…
It comes off easy and is slimy so I sucked it out with and airline hose and some small water changes… it's still growing slowly but it is manageable and apparently blackouts are suggested but again that would be nearly impossible with a riparium setup like this… it was even clogging the overflow guards thus raising the water level...
I'm also starting to think substrate ferts are inadequate as most of the submerged plants are root feeders… the only stem I have is h. Polysperma and it's doing very well with no signs of deficiency and rapid growth… but that doesn't account for the failure of the h. Tripartita…
Yesterday I added several pots of Echinodorus Quadricostatus and Echinodorus latifolius to back of the carpet section and 4 pots of Staurogyne repens spread around, some in brighter and some in darker sections… I also added some more random stems with different growing needs to try and see what works…
Today I'm adding another Hydor koralia on the opposite side to improve the circular flow of the tank because the front sections seem to be lacking… I also removed some random wood I had in the back that was disrupting the flow from the other koralia… I want to make sure I have enough flow to get the crud in suspension so it takes the trip down to the sump without settling on the substrate… I also need to upgrade my return pump as it is lacking...
Unfortunately I haven't found the time to actually clean the sump and filter yet… that's my next priority and very well could be my Achilles heal at the moment… i also dimmed the LED light intensity from 75% to 65%... I know I'm changing so much at once and therefore may not be able to ascertain the true cause of my woes, but I don't want my tank to look so ‘dirty’ anymore… the riparium section is amazing and I just want the submerged section be just as lush…
I've had no more jumpers, but the female tiger endler has ceased to exist, but not before shooting out a bunch of babies…
Anyways I'll keep you all updated on my progress... I will also take pictures to show you the lighting and where it hits the substrate... come to think of it the main growth of the h. Tripartita has actually before kind of shaded over so maybe that contributed to its demise...
