# Weeping Moss Turning Brown



## LindaC (Nov 7, 2005)

The Weeping Moss that I have in my 10 gallon tank is beginning to turn a little brown at the tips, can anyone tell me why this might be happening? All the other plants in this tank are doing exceptionally well. The moss is tied on to a piece of driftwood lighting with sewing thread. It started it out growing nicely but now all of a sudden it's turning on me. 

There is 40 watts of compact flourescent light over this tank, I'm injecting pressurized CO2, I add dry ferts, KNO3, K2SO4, Fleet, Seachem Flourish and Seachem Iron, every other day. The subtrate is ADA Aquasoil, although that wouldn't matter where the moss is not planted in the subtrate. 

Any ideas? I seem to have a terrible time growing moss for some reason, what could I be doing wrong?


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## Ajax (Apr 3, 2006)

How much of the Fleet are you dosing? Realize that Fleet is sodium phosphate. Plants cannot utilize the sodium, and the sodium WILL build up over time. I have Aquasoil in my tank, was dosing 0.3ml of Fleet for a few months, performing 30% WC every week & it still built up in my tank. Personally I think Fleet is best left for what it was designed for.

Also you didn't mention it, but I thought I'd ask, are you dosing Excel at all? That stuff is very bad for mosses.


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## LindaC (Nov 7, 2005)

No, I am not dosing any Excel in this tank. As for the Fleet, I dose 2 ml ever other day. So do you suggest moving over to the dry phosphate rather than dosing it via the Fleet? Obviously, I cannot go without doing Phosphate, my tank would be a mess.


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## Ajax (Apr 3, 2006)

Have you tested your phosphate levels? That's approximately 780mg of phosphate every week which would be over 15ppm of phosphate every week. You should be in the 2ppm range at most. That's probably your problem right there. If you wanted to continue using it I'd say no more than 1ml for the whole week.

You could use the dry ferts, Seachem phosphate, or order some of the ADA Brighty Shade which would dose the nitrogen & phosphate together as alternatives


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## Burks (May 25, 2006)

Ajax said:


> Also you didn't mention it, but I thought I'd ask, are you dosing Excel at all? That stuff is very bad for mosses.


Just to confirm this, it's true. I squirted 2mL of Excel directly in some Taiwan Moss and it killed a decent amount of moss and a great amount of hair algae.

I'd suggest cutting back on the ferts. Too much can sometimes be worse than not enough.


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