# Turning plants red --HELP!



## tsunami (Jan 24, 2004)

Plants being used:

Echinodorus tenellus "micro"
Glossostigma elatinoides
Blyxa japonica
Didiplis diandra
Rotala sp. Nanjenshan
Ludwigia arcuata
Hemigraphis traian
Isoetes sp.
Rotala rotundifolia "Green"
Rotala rotundifolia 'Colorata'
Rotala macrandra "Green"
Ludwigia sp Pantanal
...a lot of plants with the potential to become very colorful.

Bioload:
2 Nannostomus espei
3 Badis benegalensis (reverse trio)

Lighting: 2x40w (8wpg) w/ 6700k/10,000k lighting
Bulb #1: 8am-4pm
Bulb #2: 10am-6pm
Both are on for six hours out of the day

DIY CO2

Additions:
~15ppm NO3 weekly
~3ppm PO4 weekly
~6ppm K+ weekly from K2SO4
10mL Flourish weekly (2.5mLx4)
10mL Flourish Iron weekly (2.5mlx4)

Problem:

I cannot turn my plants any color other than green. The 'red' plants are a barely there orange at best, and I don't understand what is wrong. I am trying to keep PO4 high and NO3 low, since starving PO4 resulted in a horrendous algae outbreak which still haunts my tank in the form of green dust, spots of BBA, and this bizarre "dust" algae that makes the aquarium look dirty (this photo was taken the day AFTER a water change and it's already going downhill).

This layout really depends on a tapestry of variation in color from the purple Hemigraphis to the red L. arcuata and the orange Didiplis diandra... but I am simply unable to get much of anything out of the tank other than a massive algae outbreak by the end of the week.

HELP.

*Oh. This is a 10 gallon.*

Carlos


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## tsunami (Jan 24, 2004)

I am curious to know how this person managed to obtain such vibrant reds out of his Ludwigia arcuata and Rotala rotundifolia...










Carlos


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## dennis (Mar 1, 2004)

Stupid question but are you sure your CO2 levels are good all through the photo. period? IMLE, it seems everything from the lack of color to the algae problems points to bad CO2 levels. With that much wood, and possibly your substrate, you very well might be buffering your water enough to give you false CO2 readings. Can you try to bring up you levels to where you read 40-50ppm. Also, try Flourish Excel. IT should definately help with your algae issues and it seems to help the plants out a good bit also. Maybe substrate tabs are in order, something with high Fe. I wonder if you are loosing alot of your Fe due to all the light/PO4. My high light 10 also has troubles getting lots of color but my mid/lower light tanks have no trouble, even with high nitrates.......

Just a few observations, don't know if they will help or not.


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## Raul-7 (Feb 4, 2004)

Have you measured your NO3 levels? They seem to be a bit high.


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## Xema (Mar 24, 2004)

I think the "red touch" is cause of some situation... firstone, the plant, then nutrients, and the last, ligth.
CO2 is quite important, and micros too. 
when i turn on my metal halide spots i only can see green color... but when i turn on my fluorescents bulb a lot of redish tones get looked. I think in your case, a 10000K bulbs can be oculting the red colors.


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## gregorsamsa (Jan 19, 2005)

Hi,

My Arcuata also has the same problem and got the following answer from aquaticquotient.com

See this link for full help

quote:

Adding the PO4 will help to some degree with the reds.

It did best for me with hard water.
I had to keep relatively high NO3 also.
It will grow very fast if you take care of and give it some room.

I had it as the main feature in a tank.
I made it turn blood red after running the growth rate up and then letting the NO3 fall for 3 days(just added lots of CO2, light, traces, PO4 and K, ........no NO3).

This brought out the reds some.

Thing is, a red plants is generally a stressed plant, a green one is happier growing plants.

But we do Bonsai as well, so we like to torture plants I guess, I suppose if we cut the legs of critters people would think us sick.

Different attitudes certainly.

Regards,
Tom Barr

unquote

hope it helps


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## tsunami (Jan 24, 2004)

I think Dennis is right, CO2 is the culprit. I took the line out of the canister and inspected it last night. Even though I made the brew the night before, bubbling was very slow/weak. 

That's it. I am getting pressurized for this thing!

I don't think it is NO3, since my test kits regular show a reading of 0 ppm if I try to stop dosing that -- and the plants look weak and even paler when I restrict NO3.

PO4 and traces, I already add in amounts far greater than what most would even dare to add.

Carlos


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## aviel (Sep 12, 2004)

Carlos,

While CO2 is the first thing we need to look for and therefore it's probably the problem, just out of curiosity - u are dosing flourish & flourish iron so you have high iron level (0.43 ppm per day) but what about flourish trace? It contains x8 manganese and x20 zinc than basic flourish. I thought one has to roughly balance things and have enough traces when dosing that much iron. No?

Aviel.


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## Raul-7 (Feb 4, 2004)

aviel said:


> Carlos,
> 
> While CO2 is the first thing we need to look for and therefore it's probably the problem, just out of curiosity - u are dosing flourish & flourish iron so you have high iron level (0.43 ppm per day) but what about flourish trace? It contains x8 manganese and x20 zinc than basic flourish. I thought one has to roughly balance things and have enough traces when dosing that much iron. No?
> 
> Aviel.


Flourish Trace is basically nutrient rich tapwater. There are other ways to add Mg. People have done fine just using Flourish and Flourish Iron, w/out using Trace.


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## dennis (Mar 1, 2004)

True, but look how hard hes pushing the tank. I can get reds even with higher NO3 levels, sometimes. My Bylxa is red with only 36wattsPC, 8ml Flourish and no extra Fe. 30-40ppm NO3 weekly and I push the CO2 into the 40's early in the light cycle, or did until I added the controller, now it stays constant in the mid to upper 30's 

Go get pressurized, hold off on the hood if you need to do it, and throw a little Excel in for good measure. ALso, one thing I have noticed, maybe its just me, but my tanks needs to be broken in real good before I start getting the nice colors from my plants. The way you are battling algae, maybe your tank is still a little "green". Wonder if the ager thing has anything to do with DOCs or possibly nutrient precipition/ion binding in the substrate....hummmmm?


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## aviel (Sep 12, 2004)

Raul-7 said:


> Flourish Trace is basically nutrient rich tapwater. There are other ways to add Mg. People have done fine just using Flourish and Flourish Iron, w/out using Trace.


If flourish trace is rich tapwater then flourish is poor tapwater. If so then why add flourish??? If you intend to answer my question then please provide a quantitive answer - elements, percentages, etc.

Aviel.


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## shalu (Oct 1, 2004)

Aviel, check for yourself:


Direct from SeaChem website:

Flourish:

Guaranteed Analysis 
Total Nitrogen 0.07% 
Available Phosphate ( P2O5) 0.01% 
Soluble Potash 0.37% 
Calcium (Ca) 0.14% 
Magnesium (Mg) 0.11% 
Sulfur (S) 0.2773% 
Boron (B) 0.009% 
Chlorine (Cl) 1.15% 
Cobalt (Co) 0.0004% 
Copper (Cu) 0.0001% 
Iron (Fe) 0.32% 
Manganese (Mn) 0.0118% 
Molybdenum (Mo) 0.0009% 
Sodium (Na) 0.13% 
Zinc (Zn) 0.0007% 




Flourish Trace:

Guaranteed Analysis 
Boron (B) 0.0028% 
Cobalt (Co) 0.00003% 
Copper Cu) 0.0032% 
0.0032% Soluble Copper (Cu) 
Manganese (Mn) 0.085% 
0.0085%Soluble Manganese(Mn) 
Molybdenum (Mo) 0.0003% 
Zinc (Zn) 0.0169% 
0.0169% Soluble Zinc (Zn) 
Rubidium (Rh) 0.000008% 
Nickel (Ni) 0.000003% 
Vanadium (V) 0.000002%


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