• You are viewing the forum as a Guest, please login (you can use your Facebook, Twitter, Google or Microsoft account to login) or register using this link: Log in or Sign Up

Eleocharis sp mini dying

justjason88

justjason88

Member
Joined
4 Dec 2011
Messages
108
Location
South London
Hi all

Recently re scaped my large tank and decided to carpet with eleocharis sp mini. The substrate is aqua soil with tropica plant growth substrate underneath. I've got standard Juwel Rio 125L T5 lights 2x28 Watt 590mm. I bought 3 pots of tropica 1-2-grow eleocharis sp mini about 1-2 weeks ago, split them up into 8 pieces each and planted them. Admittedly i didn't set the CO2 up until yesterday as i hadn't had time to. At first they were doing OK, i noticed some patches were spreading a little. Then after a week or so the leaves started to brown at the bottom close to the substrate and then the tops of the leaves would brown and turn white/pale until it came loose and floated to the top. I'm now left with about 4 patches, the rest have died and floated to the top and i think the remaining patches are likely to die too.

This is a picture at time of planting 2 weeks ago
IMG_0865.jpg


The reason i bought this plant is because it wasn't demanding on light and CO2, it would thrive in lots but lots wasn't essential for it to do well. Any ideas where i'm going wrong, was it the lack of CO2 or light? I'm thinking of trying Marsilea hirsuta if it all dies as people are saying it's an easy carpeting plant.

Thanks

Jason
 
Your light is not so much for this plant. Leaf melting/browning is ok as eleocharis throws its old emers leaf after you plant it. But thats not a good sign that you haven't seen any new leaf meanwhile the old ones got brown.

Marsilea is a low tech plant however grows sooooooo slowly without co2
Otherwise it is the stangest plant which i've tried in the past. It is capable to grow without any light. Real survival.
 
Yeah I have marsilea in my shrimp tank (minimal amount of liquid carbon) it grows really really slowly but isn't dying! I've got some more to try on my high tech pressurised c02 tank so will see the comparison. Also have eleocharis mini on order for the high tech tank so will see how it fares too, 2x t5 ho also.
In the 2-3 week period without c02 it will have caused the issue as browning/melting is classic c02 deficiency. Whilst under this lighting without c02 it won't take long before the plant starves and under this stress is unlikely to throw out runners. I'm unsure if it will come back but would think now you have co2 running if you add more it will grow fine :)
Just to add to this the plant may well be low c02 tolerant but if using little/no c02 you also have to reduce lighting intensity as this drives the plants hunger. Your 2x t5 ho is reasonable lighting so the plant will be trying to grow fast, but without food (co2/ferts) it cant, and therefore will die.
Cheerio
Ady
 
thanks ady, very informative post :) i still have 2-3 patches that are doing ok so im hoping they'll take hold now the co2 is running. if they do i'll order some more and replace the dead patches. let me know how yours gets on. i havent started dosing ferts yet either so may start to soon
 
This thread is interesting, I intend to buy some Eleo sp mini, but having it in a low-tech tank with even less lighting than justjason88 (0.8WPG). This plant says it is suitable for low light conditions, but if the shock of going straight to no co2 and low light is too much and it's killing the plants, how could I successfully manage the transition?
 
AshRolls said:
This thread is interesting, I intend to buy some Eleo sp mini, but having it in a low-tech tank with even less lighting than justjason88 (0.8WPG). This plant says it is suitable for low light conditions, but if the shock of going straight to no co2 and low light is too much and it's killing the plants, how could I successfully manage the transition?
Click to expand...
Hi there,
well the plants we buy are all going to suffer to a degree and take a little time to acclimate to the underwater conditions we put them in. Emersed (as the eleocharis sp mini is grown) they have unlimited access to c02 but we limit this immediately when we submerge them. This is why lighting is so critical, the more intense the lighting the more demand for c02 to feed the growth. When we submerge them it is important not to offer too much light especially with low/no c02, so less is more in this case. Your .8wpg of lighting will in fact help transition the plant to low/no c02 as it will lessen its hunger for it. Being a carpet plant will help too as PAR is lower at the substrate. Growth will be slower than c02 injected tanks but less lighting is better when using less c02.
Have you thought about using a liquid carbon supplement as a pressurised gas c02 substitute as this will benefit the plants :)
Cheerio,
Ady.
 
Thanks Ady. I have considered Easy Carbo but would like to find a balance where it isn't necessary. I don't mind slow growing plants, I do mind dead plants!
 
Hi all, yes I'd be interested to know if anyone else has this problem. I have planted 4 emerse portions into my new tank with good light and co2 distribution only to find that within less than a week much of it had gone brown melted. The tank looked really nice on the day of planting, now it looks like a load of muddy dead grass. There has been some recovery but 4 weeks on I have nowhere near as much as I planted originally.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top