jprime84

I switched to all live plants last night. My question concerns adequate plant food. Right now, I just use a dose of API Leaf Zone once a week. I have also read about fertilizer tablets. Do I need both? I need to see what my watts per gallon are. Its a 20g tank with one 15w bulb and another small thin bulb that I am not sure of the wattage on. I assume I am between 1 and 2 W/g.

Also, how long should the lights be on during the day?

Robin4

Nutter

Planted tanks cause alot of heated debate so take all advice given with a grain of salt!!

It is very dependant on may variables such as the amount of light, do you use co2 or not, what type of plants & what kind of substrate you have in the tank. For the moment stick with what you are doing & follow the recommended doses on the fertilizer bottle. Don't go for co2 as you would need much more light before you could start to take advantage of it's benefits.
I'm rather reluctant to offer more advice at this point as more info is needed about your set up. Is it possible for you to post a pic of your tank or point me to where I can find a pic of it? That would help greatly.

Lights off in the middle of the day is a good idea on any planted tank IMO as it will help combat/prevent any algae problems you may encounter & it also gives you more hours when you are home for viewing the tank as most planted tanks will only have the light on for 8-12hrs to help avoid algae problems.

Nate McFin

Good advice so far. Root tabs are beneficial for root feeders such as swords and crypts. Liquid feeders feed the water colomn and work especially well for floating plants, mosses, and anubias. They do feed root feeders as well though! Heavy root feeders like those mentioned above just do a little better with the extra boost.
One important thing with any kind of fertilizers is regularity. The amount you use is dependent on light,type of plant, and as noted Co2. BUT, no matter how much you use. Do so on a tight schedule. If you do it during water changes thats fine. Plants like regularity. If you give them food one time and then not the next they will begin to slow growth big time. Which by itself isnt bad but it does allow algae to get a foothold. As long as the plants are fed on a consistant basis the algae will have a tougher time gaining a foothold. Amount is not as important as schedule!
What types did you get and where are the pics?
Best wishes,
Nate

enthusiast

your lighting is the best thing you could do for your plants. As far as food and nutrients for them, you can buy the additives and it will help improve, but they will get their own food from the fish wastes, & water changes will help also introduce a fresh round of the trace elements plants use up more quickly.

lighting is the key!!

jprime84

The pic is in my signature. As for light I have two 10,000 K daylight flourescent bulbs. One is 14w and one is 15w, so 29/20 or 1.45 watts/gallon. At this point I can easily see the new growth on all species in the tank, so I guess its going well. The anubias nana has patches of algae growing on its leaves though.

Nate McFin

Nice looking tank Jprime. It isnt showing up in your sig though. (at least for me)
Your swords still have emersed growth leaves. Those will change to submersed before long. The emersed leaves may be a little ragged. Very normal, dont worry when it happens.
Your tank is really off to a nice start though!
Not sure about the Algae as I cant see it to well.
Respectfully, I disagree about lighting being the key. Balance is the key. The balance between Nutrients, Co2 and light. when one is increased the other need to be increased as well or algae will show up.

jprime84

Theres not a clickable thumbnail in my signature on the first post in this thread? This forum seems to not always add your signature to your posts.

Nutter

Nice looking tank. Is that limestone in the back?
I have to agree with Nate McFin, balance is the key. There's no point having heaps of light if you don't have the co2 & extra nutrients to take advantage of the extra light.
If you are getting good growth & you are happy with it I probably wouldn't change too much myself. Is that normal black gravel or is it Onyx? If it is Onyx then substrate fertilizer tablets won't have any big effect on your plant growth. It would help keep the Onyx topped up with minerals though which would make it's working life abit longer.
If that is just normal freshwater gravel then I would probably put some nutrient tabs in there. One at the base of each of the plants rooted in the substrate. Being a low light tank that may be enough nutrients by itself. Tablets will need replacing periodically as they get used up. There may be others I can't see but it looks like you only have one anubius that is not in the substrate & that will still require the occasional dose of liquid ferts but it will be occasional, say once a month or every two weeks & the dose would be quite small. I use Seachem products myself as I find the results excellent & it works out very economical for me as the flourish comprehensive that I use is very concentrated, (20ml per 250lts). I use the comprehensive in conjunction with Flourish Trace to top up the nutrients that are used more rapidly by the plants than some of the other nutrients. You probably wouldn't need the trace in your current set up as you don't have the co2 & amount of light I do. Whatever you do, always work on the principle that less is more. It is easy to add more liquid ferts if you see your plants are suffering from a deficiency but it is much harder to get rid of algae if you overdose.

I can't see the algae but there are a few things that are known to cause it. Excessive lighting hours are a common culprit. Your lights should come on for between 8-12hrs a day. You will have to experiment with your lighting hours to see what works for you to give good plant growth with minimal algae. Start at 8hrs & work your way up from there.
I also find that having a 3-4hr break in my lighting period is a VERY effective way of controlling algae growth & can even eliminate some forms of algae. Plants are much more advanced than algae & can start the process of photosynthisis within a few minutes of the lights coming on usually. Algae however are not as advanced & need a long continuous lighting period before they can start photosynthisis. Giving a break in the middle of the light period denies the algae the continous light period they need to flourish. As an added advantage it gives you more hours to view your tank when you will be home as you just set the lights to have thier off break during the day when your at work, meaning they are on for a longer period when you get home from a hard day.
The type of light has a bearing on algae growth to I find. I seem to get more algae growth when I use the higher kelvin rated tubes. The higher the K rating the bluer the light. Algae love blue light I find myself. Alot of the light type is simply what you like to look at so if you like the effect your lights give you now, keep them. I personally like the look of a combination af 1 x 10,000k & 1 x 6,700k & I find the plants really like it. Many people advocate the use of tubes in the 5-10,000k range for optimum plant growth & I tend to agree but use a balance to give your plants a broader spectrum of light that they can make use of. I would be inclined to add one more tube to your tank if it is possible as most swords like fairly bright light. Be careful if you do this as it will increase your chances of algae growth. Especially if there are more nutrients in the water than your plants can use.

I hope there's some info in that lot that you find helpful.

Carolina

Leaf Zone is 50% water with 25% of Iron sulfate and 25% of Potassium sulfate.

Dry ferts last longer than the liquids thus cheaper in the long run. You might be able to get some from someone on the forum or a local aquarium club. Also can get dry fert, recommend CSM+B, at Rex Site or Aquarium fertiliser. Rex is cheaper and has info on how to dilute the ferts but is slow in mailing. The other charges about a $1 more for shipping and is faster in shipping.

I am switching from Seachem ferts to dry ferts. Since I have mineralised my substrate I only dose 2ml a week. Thus getting the CSM+B from someone at club.

Anubias nana seem to do better in shaded area. If it gets worse take it out and spray it with Excel. If you can find Excel locally you can get in on Ebay.

I have found it best to start with lights on for 5 hrs and increase an hour weekly. If you see algae back step. The WPG rule is based on out put of T12 bulb. I have been experienting with different 20 watt bulbs and find that the kelvin affects how the plants grow more than the wattage. The kelvin just gives you a rough idea of the photons that the bulbs contain. My favorite bulbs are the Life-glo and Aqua-glo.

Algae is usually due to an imbalance of light and Co2 in the water. Can also be due to exces nutrient from water plant. I have chronic BBA that I have to watch out for. I keep in under control dosing with Potassium nitrate, Spectricide stump remover from Lowe's. If gets real bad take plants out or lower the water and spray with Excell directly on the algae. Here is some info I collected:

Key to preventing algae is to
1.turn on the bright lights as the very LAST part of the setup
2.make sure you have a lot of plant mass from the very start of using those bright lights

Example
Lower lights 9hrs
high lights 6hrs

Thread algae cure.
1. 50% water change.
2. Discontinue fertilizing altogether.
3. Every day for 1 week add 1 gram of Kno3 every 50 gallons until there begin to appear Green Spot Algae.
4. CO2 increase the maximum allowable by the aquarium (at least 35 PPM).
5. Not diminish the lighting.
6. Do not modify other variables.
7. Manually remove the algae
8. When the issue is solved or after 7 days, 50% water change.
9. The amount of Kno3 you needed it achieve the GSA will be the amount you will use as fertilizing per week.
10. About the others fertilizers, use 30% of the dose you were using.