# Advice on Possibly Toxic Tank



## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

So, our 7.5gal (12x12x12) cube has been up and running for about 6-7 weeks and it hasn't been going well. Not only has plant growth been anemic at best, but despite being fully cycled it seems to kill off livestock quite rapidly. We've lost a batch of RCS (within two hours of introduction), three Nerite snails (a few days), a much smaller batch of Amano shrimp (one of them lasted about 60 hours), and even a batch of Malaysian Trumpet Snails (lasted about a week during which they seemed normal, but now none of them have moved in 48 hours). We've managed to create a surprisingly efficient death machine.

So, clearly there is something very, very wrong. We are not new to aquariums, so we do know how to do introductions and the tank is fully cycled (tested every day). (We use Seachem Prime as our dechlorinator.) And thus, we're at a loss.

Here's today's test results:
pH: 7.0 
ammonia: 0 
nitrites: 0
nitrates: 5-10ppm
GH: 6 (I follow Diana's water hardening recipe to raise GH, KH of our NYC-area water though it seems I'm still a bit low on both)
KH: 6
phosphates: 5ppm

So here's a fuller narrative to help the Hive Mind troubleshoot with us.

We used a local nursery's organic potting soil (ingredients of peat moss, Canadian sphaghnum moss, "forest products", and perlite). I did a full (nearly 10 days) mineralization process, which removed all the perlite. Because we live in an area with NYC's soft water, we did add in some dolomite and muriate of potash to the soil. And a very small amount (less than 1/4 lb) of clay for CEC (my wife is a potter, so we had that on hand). We used the Black Diamond Blasting stuff for the cap. The soil was kept at an inch and the cap at less than an inch.

We do not currently have a heater in the tank (our house stays 74-77 F in the summer), and just a very small HOB filter (the AZOO Mignon 60, which has a very low flow of 15 gph). We have had biofilm (on water surface) issues since week 3: I skim it daily, though I ran a gentle airstone, which removed the biofilm immediately, for a couple weeks as an experiment.

There is a (relatively) large piece of spiderwood driftwood in the tank but it was placed on a stone which was sitting on the glass. Though this may not have made any difference (see below).

The light is a 12 inch Finnex FugeRay Planted+. I can't seem to find published PAR values for the 12" size of this light anywhere, but the FugeRays are known to be fairly high so I built two sets of risers to put the light up off the tank (one set is 7 inches up, the other is 12 inches). I have had the tank on the "siesta" regimen (5 hours on, 4 hours off, 5 hours on) since day one, with no serious algae issues that I can see (just some usual start up diatoms) and now a bit of brown algae on the glass and the pennywort leaves.

We saw pearling on the plants the first two days and then none since. Plant growth has been poor. The amazon swords all melted away. The bacopa struggled with lots of die off until they acclimated and put out some small roots; they've since grown slightly. Dwarf Hairgrass has hung on but hasn't grown. The dwarf chain sword is similar. The tiny crypts largely died off, though that might be because it was tissue cultured and I stupidly planted it in clumps and in too shady of a location (under a driftwood shadow). Even Hornwort, which was doing okay (though the growing tips were brown) has been dying slowly and losing vigor since we added Pennywort and Salvinia. The Marsilea hirsuta (sp?), Trident Java Fern, and some Weeping Moss were the only plants that have really grown much at all. The exception is the Salvinia, which reproduced like crazy, but the new plants have TINY leaves and are very, very pale green. The Pennywort too has seen its leaves get smaller and very pale (almost white).

After the amazon swords melted, we added some vallisnerias and some medium sized crypts -- both of those melted a bit but now seem to have adjusted. At the same time we also added some new small leaved anubius that are doing okay -- one seems to be throwing out a new leaf here in the last few days.

I kept thinking the plant struggles were due to the light -- too much, too little, etc. So I've played around with the different heights a lot. None of it has made any noticeable difference. After stumbling on a thread here last week, I now suspect that maybe it's been nitrogen deficiency. Even after the tank was cycled, our nitrates were essentially zero or just trace all the time: we cycled the tank "fishless" and so were not adding in fish food. My hypothesis is that all the plants were just sucking all the nitrogen up and starving each other -- hence the small, pale growth on several of the species. I removed almost all of the Salvinia (in case it was the nitrogen hog) and did start adding small amounts of fish food every couple of days in the last week or so and perhaps that is responsible for some of the new growth I'm seeing (Anubias and Java ferns).

But even if I'm right about the cause of the lack of plant growth, the livestock deaths must have a different cause. Some more context:

Following advice in threads here, about a week or two into the tank, I began poking the substrate with a long piece of wire and sure enough I was releasing a LOT of hydrogen sulfide bubbles, particularly around the base of the driftwood. Those bubbles seemed to be inexhaustible -- every day I could release dozens or sometimes hundreds of them and the next day they would be back again just as bad. So, after the Amano shrimp debacle, I decided to pull the driftwood out. Wow! What a stink. That whole area just reeked. That discovery led to me tear down the tank: I scraped the cap off as carefully as I could and then removed the soil. About half of the soil smelled absolutely foul, particularly around the two rotting amazon sword root masses.

Not having any other soil on hand, the half of the soil that didn't smell so bad, I put back, in a much thinner layer, with a new and even thinner cap. (I did seed it with a handful or two of the old cap to help establish the bacteria colony.) And I replanted. The redone tank had a one day ammonia spike, but cycled (no ammonia, no nitrites) within 48 hours. Then we added the MTS, thinking they would keep the substrate aerated with their burrowing. They were seemingly fine for about a week (5-6 days) and managed to uproot almost all the Marsilea every few hours it seemed (so I removed most of it too), but now are all motionless for some 48 hours. Some of them are turned with the opening in their shell pointed up, and I fear the worst again.

So, I'm basically at a loss. I suspect the soil is the culprit but I can't see how or why it would have turned so toxic. Frustrated beyond words, in large part because without a plausible cause or explanation, I can't decide on what I should do now.

Do I just tough it out and give this yet more time to "stabilize"? Or, do I tear it all down and start over with new soil? And if so, which soil? (I'm leery of using using the same stuff that I mineralized and that seems to have gone toxic in case it has been contaminated with something.) I don't want to use my garden soil as it has a very high proportion of colloidal clay and the tank would not clear for months. Or do I just pack it in and go "high tech" with some commercial soil, CO2, and lots more maintenance effort (though to be honest, setting up this tank has already required many times more time, thought, and effort than I had thought it would).

EDIT: Since tearing everything out and redoing with only half the soil, I get no more bubbles of H2S, but I do know from some of Diana's posts in other threads that it can be dissolved in the water column and be leaching out of the substrate without ever forming bubbles. This is what I suspect is happening to my tank. If so, my question is why? My soil and cap are both thin (have been from the start) and the wood is resting on a rock (which is resting on the glass), hence there is no compaction of the soil happening there. Further, the Anubias and weeping moss and Java Ferns (all growing, perhaps the best of everything in the tank) are all attached to the wood, so if it was the source of the H2S one would think they would be suffering.

Pics for diagnostic purposes are below. (And I apologize for the length of this post.)








(my apologies for the red blob -- that's a reflection of my home depot water change bucket below and in front of the tank)


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

Try removing the piece of wood to see if that's the cause of the shrimp die off, and do a water change.

Try adding ferts in the water column for the plants. The soil nutrients is mostly in the substrate so rooted plants can access it but epiphytes (anubias) and stem plants have a harder time getting nutrients. It looks like you might have the macro nutrients in your water, trying adding micronutrients.

Poke around the substrate if you're getting any anaerobic spots.

*Carbon (CO2) is pretty important nutrient too. You might be low on that too.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

mistergreen said:


> Try removing the piece of wood to see if that's the cause of the shrimp die off, and do a water change.
> 
> Try adding ferts in the water column for the plants. The soil nutrients is mostly in the substrate so rooted plants can access it but epiphytes (anubias) and stem plants have a harder time getting nutrients. It looks like you might have the macro nutrients in your water, trying adding micronutrients.
> 
> Poke around the substrate if you're getting any anaerobic spots.


Hi mistergreen.

I've been poking around the substrate. Since the tank redo (about a week or nine days ago), I've gotten virtually no bubbles of H2S (just one or two). But I know Diana has said that Hydrogen sulfide can be toxic even without bubbles: it can dissolve into the water and be lethal that way too. I suspect this is what has happened in my tank (I've added a clarification to my original post on this.)

The real issue for me then, is why? The wood wasn't resting ON the soil at all, so it can't have compacted it to make it anerobic. And the H2S smell when I redid the tank was far more generalized than just the wood area. So, again, why is it happening across half or more of the substrate? It was thin, so was the cap. If I can't explain why the soil turned bad this way, then I can't prevent it from happening again with new soil, or take measures to stop it from continuing to happen now with the current soil. Most frustrating.

Finally, the epiphytes are really the only plants that have grown well -- and almost all of them are attached to the wood (one Java fern is on a plastic mesh disk and it too is growing better). So, if the wood is the source of the H2S, wouldn't these plants be doing poorly too?


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

Small amount of H2S isn't bad. They oxidize back to Sulfate (SO2, SO4) in contact with O2. 
I'm thinking the wood might be treated with some chemical or it hasn't cured so take it out.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

I suppose that's possible, though it was purchased from a reputable aquarium vendor and I boiled it for more than two hours and soaked it for more than a week before setting up the tank.


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

Sorry to hear about all these problems when obviously you have been trying hard.

I don't understand why the light source is so far from the tank. Perhaps the plants, especially the floaters, aren't getting enough light. Then those small rooted plants with not much light aren't going to keep the substrate safe or keep their root zones safely oxygenated.

Then. the spillway filter could be removing CO2. I would turn it off. After all, at this point what have you got to lose.

Finally, I would try to introduce at least one strong rooted plant. _With enough water hardness and a rich substrate, an Amazon swordplant should have easily taken over this tank. It could be that there just isn't enough light.

Still not sure what's wrong. You must be a patient person...._


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Hi Diana,

I like to think I _can be_ patient.

The light is up that high because I suspect it was far too bright when mounted low. I don't have a PAR meter, so I don't have a scientific way to verify that, but many people have report growing real high lighting plants (some of the tough carpeting species) with this exact light in 12 inch deep tanks (when used with C02). For the first two or three weeks, I had the light down low (just 2 inches off the rim)and that's when the Amazon sword melted away. Nothing really grew during those weeks, except for the Marsilea (which is known to tolerate everything from low to high light), so I built the risers to tone the light down.

I'll try stopping the filter and see -- like you say, there's little to lose. But even if that works for the plants, I suspect it won't stop the livestock deaths, which (given the water parameters) I suspect must be rooted in the soil (pun intended).

EDIT: Are Vals and Crypts considered "strong rooted" plants? I have introduced them a couple weeks ago. If they aren't, would you have another suggestion (not sure I'm wanting to try the Amazon Sword again given the poor performance of the first two).



dwalstad said:


> Sorry to hear about all these problems when obviously you have been trying hard.
> 
> I don't understand why the light source is so far from the tank. Perhaps the plants, especially the floaters, aren't getting enough light. Then those small rooted plants with not much light aren't going to keep the substrate safe or keep their root zones safely oxygenated.
> 
> ...


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

The clay you added to the substrate could be a problem if it isn't 100% natural clay. Many "clays" sold for art purposes have plastics in them and those are not solid but are soft enough to possibly leach chemicals into the water. I haven't heard of this causing anyone a problem, but when you said your wife is a potter a bell rang in my brain! It should be easy to find out what the clay is, and if it is real natural clay, you can forget it being a problem. We all occasionally have problems getting our plants to grow like we want, but most don't ever have the fish/snails, etc. die in a new tank. That seems to be the clue that we should be thinking about.

Copper in the water could be a problem, but I haven't thought of how it would get into the water.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

I'll ask my wife about her clay -- I'd bet one of my kidneys that it's 100% natural, but I'll have her make completely sure.

And I agree with you: the slow plant growth is one thing, but the livestock dying seems like not the usual suspects of things that go wrong. Even the shrimp, I could see being a "normal" thing to bungle a time or two. But snails? Malaysian Trumpet Snails? That seems a whole different level of wrong!

I too wondered about copper. It's the one test kit I don't have on hand, but I too can't imagine how it got into the tank unless there's just a huge amount in the water to begin with.



hoppycalif said:


> The clay you added to the substrate could be a problem if it isn't 100% natural clay. Many "clays" sold for art purposes have plastics in them and those are not solid but are soft enough to possibly leach chemicals into the water. I haven't heard of this causing anyone a problem, but when you said your wife is a potter a bell rang in my brain! It should be easy to find out what the clay is, and if it is real natural clay, you can forget it being a problem. We all occasionally have problems getting our plants to grow like we want, but most don't ever have the fish/snails, etc. die in a new tank. That seems to be the clue that we should be thinking about.
> 
> Copper in the water could be a problem, but I haven't thought of how it would get into the water.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

Are you able to get a water quality report for the tap water you use? It should provide the concentration of copper typically in the water.


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

Are you in NYC?
The water is fine but the pipings are really old so it's possible it's leaching copper, possible lead too. They do sell copper test kit on amazon.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Hoppy and mistergreen - yeah I'll follow up on the copper. I haven't bothered because there are lots of aquarium stores in the area and if copper in the water was a widespread problem I'm sure it would be known. In any case, I'll likely order a copper test kit just so I can rule that out too. 

I'm not in NYC itself, but just north so the water supply is identical (same reservoir). I have tried looking for water quality info from the water company, but the website is a maze of broken links, dead ends, yearly pdf reports that recount every project but don't give any water quality standards, so I gave up after several unproductive attempts. (My google-fu is usually pretty good, but I failed here.) 

EDIT: So I did some more googling and did in fact find the 2019 data. Unless 2020 is markedly different, or my local neighborhood is independently contaminated, I suspect the water is just fine. (Will test tapwater for copper here in the house once the test kit arrives.) 
LEAD: highest concentration detected all year 6.71 ppb (parts per billion)
COPPER: highest concentration detected all year 0.184 ppm (parts per million) -- "action level" (when the system has to take action to correct the situation) is 1.3 ppm, so in 2019 at least it never got even close. 

Since both plants and animals have struggled or died, I still feel the main problem has to be with the soil, with the most likely culprit being H2S. I just don't understand the why, which makes it difficult or impossible to rectify it in this tank or prevent it if I start over with new soil. So frustrating. And humbling. In our previous aquariums, we never had a single outbreak of disease or tank death (except for old age) in over a decade. I didn't think it could be THAT much harder to set up a planted tank. Boy was I wrong.


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## Karen in San Jose (Jun 1, 2020)

Is it possible you used the wrong dosage of water conditioner? I recently killed off a bunch of blackworms in my tank by dosing water incorrectly (in a big way - eek). Just grabbing at a straw that hasn't been mentioned yet. But, when I did this, it didn't kill the snails or the shrimp that were in the tank, or even all of the blackworms - just the ones right where I was pouring it in. The problem with the water conditioners is they don't always tell you what's in them, so I am now leery and very careful. At any rate, just a thought that hasn't been mentioned.

But, you know for sure there is something in the water if it's killing off livestock that quickly, after it's cycled. How terribly frustrating for you!


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

shudaizi said:


> Are Vals and Crypts considered "strong rooted" plants? I have introduced them a couple weeks ago. If they aren't, would you have another suggestion (not sure I'm wanting to try the Amazon Sword again given the poor performance of the first two).


Yes, Vals especially are strong rooted plants. Crypt take longer to establish, but once they get going, they are relentless.

This melting away of the Swordplant should not have happened. NYC's soft water makes me think that GH may have been way off. Or the H2S?

I wouldn't worry about copper or lead. You should have enough DOC in the tank to neutralize (i.e., chelate) these toxins.

Keep an eye on the stem plants. If healthy, they should be moving towards the surface. If not, I would lower the light.

You may have to keep tinkering until you figure out what the problem is. Remember that it could be multiple problems, not just one.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Karen in San Jose said:


> Is it possible you used the wrong dosage of water conditioner? I recently killed off a bunch of blackworms in my tank by dosing water incorrectly (in a big way - eek). Just grabbing at a straw that hasn't been mentioned yet. But, when I did this, it didn't kill the snails or the shrimp that were in the tank, or even all of the blackworms - just the ones right where I was pouring it in. The problem with the water conditioners is they don't always tell you what's in them, so I am now leery and very careful. At any rate, just a thought that hasn't been mentioned.
> 
> But, you know for sure there is something in the water if it's killing off livestock that quickly, after it's cycled. How terribly frustrating for you!


Hi Karen -- Thanks for chiming in! I'm really at a loss, so every suggestion helps even if only by double or triple checking to rule something out. As for dechlorinator, I'm pretty careful to measure out the right dose (two drops per gallon, plus two extra in case my eyedropper is a little shy in its drop size) of Prime as the first step when I'm making up a batch of 5 gallons of water. My steps are add prime to bucket, maybe a gallon of water, then add Diana's water hardening ingredients, then the rest of the water. I'm sure it's possible that I'd goof once, but pretty sure I wouldn't make the error multiple times over nearly two months.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Glad to hear the Vals should do the strong rooting thing! When I re-did the tank, they had been in only a week or two and a couple of them were already putting out runners. So, hopefully they will continue that in the re-done substrate too.

The sword plant really had me bummed and confused too. It's possible the GH was off, but I do follow your water hardening recommendations. My GH has come down a bit since the start of the tank (perhaps the tannins from the driftwood? or leaching from the peat-based soil), but at the start it was testing at 8-9, even as the sword was dying off.

I have lowered the light and removed the HOB filter. The MTS came with two stems of Anacharis one of which I planted in the tank (free plants!). Surprisingly, it has been growing strongly. And last night with the light lower and the filter gone, it was pearling like mad. Haven't seen that since the first two days of the tank. The downside is that the biofilm is quite bad this morning with no surface agitation at all.

I'll keep tinkering, not only because I want to succeed, but also because I really want to understand what has happened in the tank.

A new wrinkle: for the first time this morning I saw white worms on the glass (maybe 20-30). Tried getting a magnified view to see if these are planaria that hitchhiked on the Anacharis, but they are so small that even my macro lens can't show them clearly enough to tell for sure. My suspicion is that they are simply detritus worms given that there's a lot of detritus in the tank these days and not a lot for planaria to dine on with no livestock around.

In any case, I appreciate all the help and ideas. Having outside eyes is appreciated when I'm (a) new at this and (b) kinda at a loss having exhausted my (very shallow pool of) knowledge.



dwalstad said:


> Yes, Vals especially are strong rooted plants. Crypt take longer to establish, but once they get going, they are relentless.
> 
> This melting away of the Swordplant should not have happened. NYC's soft water makes me think that GH may have been way off. Or the H2S?
> 
> ...


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

Changed my mind. With this anaerobic problem, I would keep the spillway filter going to keep water aerated. And I would bring light lamp closer to the tank in hopes of rescuing floating and stem plant(s).

Hope you can figure it out. Something is _way off_ here--starting with the early death of the swordplants.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Well, I'll admit I'm kinda glad to see that even The Expert isn't sure what is going on. That makes me feel somewhat less stupid for not figuring this out on my own.

I had kept the HOB filter going for precisely that reason: to keep the water aerated. And I can stick it back on anytime. What's interesting is that today, after having the light close and the filter off for two days, I'm seeing pearling on a number of plants: both stems of Anacharis, several of the Vallerisnia, the Christmas moss ... all with steady streams of bubbles. And one of the Java fern Tridents has bubbles all over the underside of the leaves. Haven't seen this kind of obvious plant activity since day 1-2 of the tank. So, I think I'll give this a few more days with the filter off to see if this continues (i.e., your first inclinations / thoughts might be right).

EDIT: Less positively, the Hornwort finally just disintegrated today. And the Pennywort (Hydrocotyle) seems even paler than it was. No idea why those plants are failing as they have reputations for being pretty much bulletproof.

If it goes south again, I might end out breaking it down, starting over with some mineral-based top soil (instead of the peat-based one I tried this time) and rocks instead of driftwood. That's my back up plan I guess.



dwalstad said:


> Changed my mind. With this anaerobic problem, I would keep the spillway filter going to keep water aerated. And I would bring light lamp closer to the tank in hopes of rescuing floating and stem plant(s).
> 
> Hope you can figure it out. Something is _way off_ here--starting with the early death of the swordplants.


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

shudaizi said:


> Because we live in an area with NYC's soft water, we did add in some dolomite and muriate of potash to the soil.


Start back to the death of the swordplants. Whatever was the problem, it started then. If you had soil and a good light source (lamp close to water surface), swordplants should not have suddenly died. They would have enough stored nutrients to at least make a respectable showing for awhile.

The soil _alone_ is probably okay. Maybe NYC water is not optimal long-term, but it is not that quick a killer.

I would focus on what you added to the soil. I don't know what muriate of potash is or how much you added or how much dolomite lime you added. Excessive amounts of one or both of these additions could have killed the soil microflora causing later problems.

Folks, if you want to increase water hardness in softwater, please follow my recommendations (my book, p 87).


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

dwalstad said:


> Start back to the death of the swordplants. Whatever was the problem, it started then. If you had soil and a good light source (lamp close to water surface), swordplants should not have suddenly died. They would have enough stored nutrients to at least make a respectable showing for awhile.
> 
> The soil _alone_ is probably okay. Maybe NYC water is not optimal long-term, but it is not that quick a killer.
> 
> ...


Basically I followed the directions on this thread https://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/apc-library/52554-how-mineralized-soil-substrate-aaron-talbot.html, by Aaron Talbot here at APC. (Muriate of potash is just potassium chloride -- same thing as in your recipe for water hardening.) I used a small amount (a sprinkling on the glass) of both that and dolomite (essentially Ca/Mg).

With all that said, your experience telling you that the Sword dying is remarkable and should be the clue reaffirms what I've been thinking too: that something is wrong, really wrong, with the soil. Whether that is something that I added or it was contaminated (somehow?) by the local nursery I don't know, but there seems to be something drastically wrong _at the very outset_ of the tank. Which leads me to think I should break it down and start over, using different soil, as whatever is causing this quite possibly will never go away.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

"...there seems to be something drastically wrong at the very outset of the tank. Which leads me to think I should break it down and start over, using different soil, as whatever is causing this quite possibly will never go away." 

That would be a good decision! After all, we hobbyists enjoy setting up an aquarium, so we could see this as a great opportunity to enjoy what we do. I move often, and always enjoy setting up my tank or tanks one more time.


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Indeed! So, five days ago we broke the tank down completely and started over.

A couple days before we had purchased some "topsoil" from a local greenhouse. They make it themselves, from 75% inorganic soil (i.e., inorganic hill excavation, I assume) with 25% organic material. And it's well aged (as in the organics are very broken down). Very different stuff than the all organic "potting soil mix" we tried before. We sifted it for stones and pebbles and the result is a lovely, soft sand-like mixture. We put a 1" thick layer, topped with more Black Diamond blasting stuff that we had as the substrate in our cycled (but empty) quarantine tank. We got some more plants (two more Amazon Swords, some Staurogyne repens, couple more Vallisneria, and some Water wisteria too) and some stones (petrified wood with lovely reds and purple-grays) and a much, much smaller driftwood for hardscape. Attached the wood to one of the stones and completely redid the tank. We replanted all the plants after washing their roots well of the old soil. We also discovered that four of the MTS had, in fact, survived The Great Toxicity of 2020, so they were added too. And we plopped in a couple of filter sponges from the cycled quarantine tank as well. Kept the light low over the tank. No filtration at all and, despite my fear that the topsoil would have a lot of clay that would cloud the tank, the water cleared in two days.

Because the tank cycled immediately (thanks to the colonized substrate and sponges), and to make sure there was no nitrogen deficiency as I suspect happened last time, we went and liberated an abused Mustard Gas betta from the local petsmart. Trench, as we call him, has been enjoying the tank and eating well. He picked off virtually all the detritus worms within the first few hours. (He did lose a segment of his tail in the net, but hopefully it will grow back in his new digs.) We weren't going to do a betta tank, but we also didn't want to wait any longer to start adding fish food daily and shipping livestock when it's 95+ nearly every day just is inviting disappointment.

The MTS have hardly been seen; they burrowed under the substrate almost immediately and largely stay there. There are new "furrows" showing their paths every morning. (They stayed on the surface of the substrate in the previous iteration -- another indication that the soil was just bad somehow.) The plants seem to be doing well. No major leaf melt by anything so far (just one of the Val runner-daughters has two leaves going transparent in the last day). The Anacharis is growing like crazy (new shoots all over the place). We got crazy pearling the first evening, though now it is just a plant here and a plant there. (I still don't understand why "new" water means crazy pearling that stops after one night -- happened last time too.) Two crypts seem to have small new leaves that weren't there before and I think one of the Amazon swords is pushing a new leaf already too.

Quick, off-kilter phone pic below. (Sorry about the visible white super glue dots -- hopefully the java fern rhizome covers those quickly.)

And finally, I now have a theory about the first tank soil as I did a little more detective work on the materials I used. When we purchased the potting soil it was to do our annual repotting of our houseplants. We bought two bags. The bag I used when doing our aquarium listed the ingredients as simply organic plant matter really, or so I thought. But I double checked the OTHER bag right before we broke down the tank, and lo and behold, that bag lists "a wetting agent" too. With no indication what it is. I went back to the first bag and sure enough, there was a sticker and a tear right over that ingredient, so I completely missed it. Now, I have no idea what precise "wetting agent" the nursery used, but it seems plausible to me that it could have messed up the soil chemistry once it was immersed permanently. (It seems to have no detrimental effects on our house plants as we've used this same stuff successfully for years.) So, that's my theory about why the tank was failing.





hoppycalif said:


> "...there seems to be something drastically wrong at the very outset of the tank. Which leads me to think I should break it down and start over, using different soil, as whatever is causing this quite possibly will never go away."
> 
> That would be a good decision! After all, we hobbyists enjoy setting up an aquarium, so we could see this as a great opportunity to enjoy what we do. I move often, and always enjoy setting up my tank or tanks one more time.


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## Karen in San Jose (Jun 1, 2020)

Wow, that's really pretty! I had to really look to find the superglue spots. It's really not noticeable, and the plants will cover it up in no time. What a handsome betta, too. Well done!


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## shudaizi (Jun 9, 2020)

Thanks, Karen -- you're very kind!

After a full week, the tank is settling in nicely. We've seen major pearling the last two days. The Anacharis is simply exploding (nine new shoots!); crypts are putting out new leaves and one of them is covered in small bubbles and pearling like mad; one of the Amazon swords has a new leaf that has gone from a sprout to bigger than its original leaves in three days!; dwarf hairgrass is sending up new blades (sparse but definitely new); new leaf on one of the Anubias. the weeping moss has lots of bubbles when the lights are on; water wisteria has roots sprouting all over and heading into the substrate. The trident java ferns are showing little change so far, but they are slow growers and have been traumatized more than the others (the break down of the old tank meant prying their rhizomes off rocks, cleaning away the superglue and inevitably removing some root hairs with that, etc.). The only plant that I'm somewhat concerned about are the Vallisneria -- a number of blades have gone transparent and I've pruned them out. Not sure why (allelopathy? or just still settling in perhaps?) But after the drawn out decline of the first attempt, this is a relief. Seems that the redo is on its way! Happy days!



Karen in San Jose said:


> Wow, that's really pretty! I had to really look to find the superglue spots. It's really not noticeable, and the plants will cover it up in no time. What a handsome betta, too. Well done!


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