# Emersed growth nutrient deficiency?



## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

I noticed something with my C. longicauda the other day. Older leaves will turn yellowish with dark green
veins and the tips of the leaf will start withering. To me, that indicates a nutrient deficiency. Hard to fathom since
I do fertilize my plants. Overall, the C. longicauda is growing well - though I've got shorter petioles than
most pictures Ive seen of it. Any ideas guys?


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## Kai Witte (Jan 30, 2006)

Hello Ghanzanfar,

It could also be overdosing of another nutrient.

Any pics? (Please include a scale.)

What are you utilizing as fertilizer (composition) and how much?


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## rs79 (Dec 7, 2004)

Do the tips curl before they start withering?


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Not that I can tell - but if they do- what does that indicate?


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## rs79 (Dec 7, 2004)

Excessive nitrate. "Excessive" is relative though and means "greater than they're used to" not any specific level of NO3.


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## Xema (Mar 24, 2004)

Along the time keeping crypts I had moments I passed too much time without taking care of my crypt-domes. That means I did not change water and did not adding ferts. When that is occurring -and I mean about 5 or 6 month with any kind of care-, the only one symptom I saw, was a sort of hole in the blade and some melting around the edge of the blade.

In the oder hand I have been observing different malformation in leaves due to fungus infection and micronutrients over dosing.


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Here's the longicauda that's showing problems.


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## Kai Witte (Jan 30, 2006)

If other crypts don't show similar symptoms, I'd guess at too much nutrients rather than a real deficiency. I'd flush the pot with lots of DI water and use less fertilizer than before...


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## Xema (Mar 24, 2004)

Looks really strange, looks like an iron deficient, but it not logic. In low pH, iron get itself dissolved easily, so little traces in the soil or water would be enough for the plants
Try to add a little bit of iron chelate. 
Currently I only add little amounts of NPK and iron chelate, that seems enough for me.


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

I'll flush the system out today along with the pots and not add an ferts - will report back in a couple of weeks.


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## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

Ghazanfar; Check the pH. Mine looks the same. It might not be a deficiency because of too little nutrient but because of very low pH. Very low pH binds certain nutrients and causes artificial deficiencies which can be difficult to correct with just nutrients. You may be able to correct the problem by raising the pH slightly. I haven't had the time to verify this with my own plant yet.

Cheers.
Jim


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Jim - that exact thought did cross my mind. Ive moved one plant to my freshwater setup last week to see if that makes a difference. Time will tell. 

I flushed the system out just the same - I can always add ferts back in if I see a need.

Either way - should get some good info from this.


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## rs79 (Dec 7, 2004)

It looks chloritic as hell.

Show it to Tom Barr. He's got an uncanny knack of looking at leaves and telling you what's probably wrong.


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## Xema (Mar 24, 2004)

C. longicauda lives in blackwater swamps, where pH is really low, so its catching-nutrients mechanism will not work fine out of range. In the other hand many of these nutrients are metals and they can get undissolved easily when they are near to neutral pH due to redox reaction. So plants that live in this kind of environment have those kind of mechanism I said above... Of course this is my point of view.

In my experience I only saw that kind of markings in C.yujii when pH is raised up to 5.5 or 6. But never seen on C. longicuada.Usually I keep pH around 4 to 4.5


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

That's pretty much where my pH is. - 4.2 - 4.5


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

I mis-spoke earlier - the veination issue shows up both on new leaves and old leaves.


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## rs79 (Dec 7, 2004)

Try dosing a LOT of iron and see if it changes the nature of the problem any.

I'm missing something here, I can't put my finger on it but I think there's something that blocks the uptake of iron.

Course, I've been wrong before.


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## Kai Witte (Jan 30, 2006)

These plants are adapted to get their nutrients from what the (almost) daily rainwater brings along: You'll have a really tough time to starve them if you don't shut off any supply.

It's much more likely that some antagonist to a given nutrient is present at an excessive amount: rising the amount of the "blocked" nutrient doesn't make too much sense since some other antagonist is likely to make problems rather sooner than later; it's fairly easy to remove excess nutrients by mere flushing though.


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## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

Ghazanfar;

I've been reading my old plant nutrition texts for causes of your chlorosis problem. Principle causes of chlorosis are:
1. Fe deficiency - insufficient iron available in the substrate for root uptake,
2. Fe deficiency - pH too low causing iron binding (we can rule this out for the reasons Xema mentioned above),
3. Fe deficiency - pH too high (calcium binding), we can rule this out as you reported the pH as 4.2 - 4.5,
4. Fe deficiency - competitive effects from other available cations (Mn2+, Cu2+, Ca2+, Mg2+, K+, or Zn2+)
5. Mg deficiency - Mg deficiency looks just like iron deficiency except it begins in the older leaves and progresses to the newer leaves.

If you noticed the chlorosis in the older leaves first, I'd give it a shot of Mg and see how it reacts. If not, I'd give it an extra shot of Fe as Richard suggested as it is probably the antagonistic effects of another cation. (Thanks Kai for jogging my memory).

Too bad I don't have any good contacts with Ag. Research Service at work. I could take a leaf in and ask for a tissue analysis.

Cheers.
Jim


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

Im going to wait it out until I see a couple new leaves on the plants to see if flushing the system out made any difference. Another week or so and I'll take another picture.


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

OK - here's the update.

Its been about 10 days since I flushed the system out.

All 4-5 of the longicaudas in the system have new leaves now. Take a look.





































Notice anything? New leaves are coming in BROWN. On all the plants. This is not normal to what I've been seeing with my plants in THIS setup. So - there is a difference.

ALSO - notice that there are spathes coming up on TWO of the plants. Interesting eh?


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## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

Wow! What a difference. Now I'm wondering if flushing things out reduced a nutrient excess that was preventing the plants from flowering, or if it was just coincidental timing.

Cheers.
Jim


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

I cannot say if it was coincidental or not. Tis the season for flowers though.
However, both spathes are exactly the same size - indicating they started growing
around the same time.


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## rs79 (Dec 7, 2004)

There's something hideously wrong with that mutant plant and I'm seriously concerned for your well being.

You'd better send it to me where I have the proper containment and facilities to deal with it.


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## AaronT (Apr 26, 2004)

Weren't you and Jim telling me that some of the people at the ECS are using plain old Miracle Gro in their blackwater setups? I believe you mentioned something about them measuring the conductivity to make sure it did not exceed 400 microsiemens. 

Based on that I setup a 250 ml glass beaker with RO water. I tested it to read about 3-4 µS. 

I then added 1.0 grams of Miracle Gro Bloom to the water and measured again. The conductivity was off the charts. No surprise there really. I set it up again and this time I added 0.1 grams of the Miracle Gro Bloom. It reads about 788 µS. 

I plan to use this information to dose my tank every couple of weeks such that the water inside reaches about 200-300 microsiemens. 

I'm using the Bloom food because it was highest in phosphates. It's probably a good idea to test each formula separately as they'll effect the conductivity differently.


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## rs79 (Dec 7, 2004)

May I suggest using traditinal aquarium DIY ferts, heavy on the iron?

I've never been able to grow cordata in my water, ever. I'm finding now with enough iron I can.

This is what I use:
http://aquaria.net/articles/plants/fertsols/

I'm assuming the fertilization regime for emersed Crypts is the same as Orchids and Bromeliads: "weakly, weekly".


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## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

AaronT said:


> Weren't you and Jim telling me that some of the people at the ECS are using plain old Miracle Gro in their blackwater setups? I believe you mentioned something about them measuring the conductivity to make sure it did not exceed 400 microsiemens.


Exactly. During the discussion I made the mistake of mentioning that experienced horticulturalists in the US recommend using 1/4 of the lable strength on a weekly basis when fertilizing anything. (Feed weakly, weekly was how we were taught.) Half the people in the room looked at me with a kindly "You clearly don't understand" look. It was then explained to me that fertilizers are not consistent in their percentages and by measuring the conductivity you get consistent concentrations time after time. Ah, Yes! Hort-402, plant nutrition, in laymans terms.

Since then I've switched my fertilization regimen to using MSU for pure water at 125ppm during each watering for all my plants. While not showing that spectacular growth spurt that regular fertilizer applied at the label strength will give, I'm getting steady growth with no excess salt build up showing in my houseplants which means they are using everything being given them. And for my Crypts, if they show any abnormality, they are only showing minor deficiency symptoms instead of toxicity symptoms.

Cheers.
Jim


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

From the discussions we have on ferts and siemens, I thought the plants were maintained in water contains 400 ms of fert. I quickly realized, that you cannot maintain that - unless every week you drain the system out and replace with water containing 400 ms of ferts. 
Maybe I misunderstood.

The other option is what Aaron and Jim are doing - adding a low dosage of ferts in weekly.

I need clarification. ECS 08 - here I come.


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## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

ECS 2008 is starting to look a little iffy for me. As much as we love traveling, Marlene and I have already been to Vienna and she wants to go somewhere new.

My initial understanding was the same as Ghazanfar's until like him I realized that you need to either drain and replace the solution, or you need to calculate what was used, a la PPS (Perpetual Preservation System - see science of fertilizing threads) which just doesn't seem doable considering a fair number of ECS members were starting to grow Crypts in jars, butter tubs, and take-away soup containers.

Cheers.
Jim


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## Kai Witte (Jan 30, 2006)

Hello fertilizing crypt freaks! 



> From the discussions we have on ferts and siemens, I thought the plants were maintained in water contains 400 ms of fert. I quickly realized, that you cannot maintain that - unless every week you drain the system out and replace with water containing 400 ms of ferts.


Yes, that's what the very careful folks do: draining the old water and adding a good quality (= low chloride) fertilizer until reaching approx. 400 uS/cm (that's u=my for microSiemens - not mS=milliSiemens!). Of course, you can also refill with DI water to make up for evaporation and choose to only change a part of the tank water.

Actually, I'm adding even less nutrients - if any - and often don't hit that "limit"...)

OTOH, quite a few crypts do fine into the early 1000uS/cm but you gotta be careful, especially with the blackwater and "rainwater" crypts!



> The other option is what Aaron and Jim are doing - adding a low dosage of ferts in weekly.


Yes, you can do that, too (I'd recommend to start with 1/10th of the regular concentration or less). But with this approach you have to be careful that (some) salts/nutrients don't build up in a closed system: it's easy to regularly flush house plants with rainwater, let them drain thoroughly, and go on with any suitable fertilizing scheme. Just remember that it's far easier to kill a crypt by overfeeding than by starving them for nutrients. I know - I managed to do both!


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## Kai Witte (Jan 30, 2006)

Hello Ghazanfar,



> Its been about 10 days since I flushed the system out.
> 
> ... there are spathes coming up on TWO of the plants.


Seems like it worked! 

10 days seems to be fast to develop an inflorescence from scratch but it may be possible that your plants were just waiting for a trigger... Do the other longicauda also show signs of flowering in the mean time?

Next time just flush a half of your tank!


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## AaronT (Apr 26, 2004)

So am I understanding that you regularly do water changes on your blackwater setups Kai? I haven't been doing that and perhaps I should consider it. I hardly ever fertilize them though.

Is it necessary to actually remove the pots and rinse them or is doing a water change enough?


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## Kai Witte (Jan 30, 2006)

Hello Aaron,



> So am I understanding that you regularly do water changes on your blackwater setups Kai?


Nah, I'm just too lazy. I have some tanks (emersed set-ups as well as aquaria) where I haven't been doing any water changes since years. 



> I haven't been doing that and perhaps I should consider it. I hardly ever fertilize them though.


That sounds close to what I'm doing... 



> Is it necessary to actually remove the pots and rinse them or is doing a water change enough?


No, just changing water and refilling the tank will do (unless you built up a severe nutrient overdose/imbalance - then flushing and draining the tank one or two times may be advisable).


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## Ghazanfar Ghori (Jan 27, 2004)

That water change had a very big effect. Plants are growing bigger, better, faster, stronger. (Sing to Kanye West - Stronger beat.)


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## DelawareJim (Nov 15, 2005)

Ghazanfar Ghori said:


> That water change had a very big effect. Plants are growing bigger, better, faster, stronger. (Sing to Kanye West - Stronger beat.)


See! I told y'all he sings to his plants! The secrets out! :bounce:

Cheers.
Jim


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## joe faria (Feb 22, 2008)

Ghazanfar Ghori said:


> Here's the longicauda that's showing problems.


hi,
It looks like a lack of Mg or Ca.

Regards,

Joe Faria.


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