# Tonina fluviatilis tips vs lower stems.



## jmontee (Feb 7, 2008)

Hi all,

Is it normal for the lower stems of t fluviatilis to get brown and bare? Probably not but the tips look great and it's just lower on the stems. Currently using 130w of PC and 56w of T5 for a total of around 3.5wpg. I am dosing EIish just a little less than recommended because I am not completely planted. Also my tap is around 1.0 with phosphates anyway so I am dosing less on the PO4. I do not dose Mg or Ca but I have aroud 4dGH and no way of testing Mg. What are your suggestions? Sorry about the orientation I tried to edit the pics on photobucket but it obviously didn't work.

Whole plants:










Some lower stems:


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## ashappard (Jun 3, 2006)

not normal. I'm going to guess macro deficiency and say nitrate or potassium is too low. My T.fluviatilis doesent look that way unless my tank becomes unstable.


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## Tinuviel82 (Sep 16, 2006)

I had this problem too..

Eventually the plants died.. I think my water was not soft enough


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

Do you dose CO2 too, and how much? CO2 is always the most important nutrient for plants, since they are largely made of carbon.


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## jmontee (Feb 7, 2008)

Absolutely, I dose to even maybe a little over 30ppm by my drop checker. I am at 1 bps into a reactor. Not sure what the heck is going on. My phosphates were through the roof before I did my last water change, between 5 and 10 on my API test kit. I did have this kit calibrated when I first got it. My only problem is that my API nitrate kit just doesn't work. I tested a 10ppm calibrator solution and it looked like somewhere between 0 and 5ppm. I don't trust it but I am dosing 3/8 tsp of KNO3 three times a week. I didn't want to go with the full dose because I have a few empty spaces of substrate so I didn't want to overdose. I am doing 50% water changes every week. Could it be a Mg or Ca deficiency?


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

Hmmmm.

I'm going to disagree here and state that it is common for almost any stem plant to show ugly, bare lower portions. Most aquascapers place appropriate mid-ground and foreground plants to cover up this part of the plant.

It usually amounts to the amount of light that lower parts of the plant are receiving. This issue is seen more frequently in tall tanks where light levels really drop off down near the substrate. As long as the top 1/2 of the plant shows good, healthy growth, I don't think this is indicative of a nutrient deficiency.


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## FobbyBobby23 (Mar 8, 2005)

^^ i've seen that reflected with my experience as well

in addition, tonina likes softer water anyways, so dosing mg/ca probably won't do much help

also, in my experience with tonina, they tend to not show such brown stems when you propagate them by planting the first 2 or so inches of the tip


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## cah925 (Jun 23, 2007)

BryceM said:


> Hmmmm.
> 
> I'm going to disagree here and state that it is common for almost any stem plant to show ugly, bare lower portions. Most aquascapers place appropriate mid-ground and foreground plants to cover up this part of the plant.
> 
> It usually amounts to the amount of light that lower parts of the plant are receiving. This issue is seen more frequently in tall tanks where light levels really drop off down near the substrate. As long as the top 1/2 of the plant shows good, healthy growth, I don't think this is indicative of a nutrient deficiency.


I agree with BryceM on this one. My Tonina does the same thing, in fact all my stems in the same tank eventually get to this point and I attribute it to not enough light reaching the bottom portions of the plants. I had at one time about 25-30 Tonina planted densly together. Once roots began growing above the substrate, it cut off a lot of the light to the lower leaves and I noticed the browing of leaves. The tops remained bright green and healthy, so I just moved some lower growing plants in front to hide the brownish stems.

This particular tank was extremely overgrown so I pulled everything out this past weekend and trimmed the bottom portions off and replanted to get rid of the unsightly browing stems and massive roots that were blocking the light from reaching the bottoms. I also added an extra 55 watts of light. The loach was not very happy with all the extra light and actually swam upsteam into the HOB filter to hide.


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## jmontee (Feb 7, 2008)

Sounds great guys, thanks for the info. I was afraid that I was killing them. They will be a midground plant for me anyway so I will probably be cutting and replanting the tops most of the time anyway. 

BTW, how long should the sideshoots be before I remove them? I took some off that were about an inch and they don't seem to be doing to well.


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## cah925 (Jun 23, 2007)

I would leave them alone until they are long enough to replant. Just keep in mind that the lower parts of your stems are not doing well from lack of light. Any stems that are too short will also suffer from this lack of light and therefore have trouble growing if planted in close proximity to the existing stems.


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## gigi (Jun 22, 2005)

Tonina end all plants like tonia spec.(fluviatilis ,belem) 
Lover a ph down 6,5 in water end substrat ph around 5,5 ---6,5
ADA aqua soil amazonia is the best soil for him 
Else soil not so good


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## mrkookm (Oct 25, 2006)

ashapper said:


> not normal.


Agreed. That deterioration is not caused by lower light.


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## ashappard (Jun 3, 2006)

BryceM said:


> Hmmmm.
> 
> I'm going to disagree here and state that it is common for almost any stem plant to show ugly, bare lower portions. Most aquascapers place appropriate mid-ground and foreground plants to cover up this part of the plant.
> 
> It usually amounts to the amount of light that lower parts of the plant are receiving. This issue is seen more frequently in tall tanks where light levels really drop off down near the substrate. As long as the top 1/2 of the plant shows good, healthy growth, I don't think this is indicative of a nutrient deficiency.


I guess macro deficiency because the older portions of the plant are affected, however it may be possible that KH is too high which will cause a die-off that is common with many who try toninas. my first and second attempt with toninas was a disaster, the stems melted slowly because water parameters were not appropriate. I settled on KH=0 / GH=4 and am happy with the results.

toninas should look nice all the way to the substrate if they are healthy and in good growing conditions. Someone mentioned aquasoil as a good medium for toninas and I'll second that, my toninas in aquasoil do very well although I do not believe that toninas need a nutritious substrate.



mrkookm said:


> Agreed. That deterioration is not caused by lower light.


hey mrkookm! reasheed has some of the healthiest toninas and erios around.


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