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Polysperma, Ludwigia arcuata & ADA Macrandra Green - Dying or thriving?

IndyM

Member
Joined
4 Mar 2020
Messages
74
Location
London
Are my plants dying or thriving? They have c02, daily ADA ferts, and lots of light, new setup, 7 days old with amazonia soil. Polysperma has started changing to a brownish colour, pale at the tops, the ludwigia is going reddish and the macrandra Green which is still baby having come out of in vitro, is going whiter at the tops.

Is my light too intense? Or on too long perhaps?


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the bottom half is all ok. this is why I was thinking it might be light intensity/duration related, well, I guess I can start dosing my ADA iron then.
 
Polysperma and arcuata are colouring up as they are supposed to do, growing in good light. Polysperma will likely stay only a little coloured, but your arcuata will likely gat a much more intense colour.
The macrandra 'green' I know of, tends to grow a bit yellowish - often even slightly pink - in newest growth, grown in good light. It actually present itself very well in a group mixed with the standard red macrandra.
The orange tips on your Rotala 'bonzai' says that you have a good level of light.
I too find the plants a little pale, though - so fertilisation, especially regarding iron, is probaply a little low. These are quite fast growing plants, therefore consuming quite a lot of fertiliser.
 
It’s natural for the stems you mentioned to get sun tan approaching light source on top. They are thriving, not dying. It’s an indication you have high light intensity on top, but low to medium light at the bottom. If you want uniform color from top to bottom as in Dutch garden, you need to double to triple your light intensity so high intensity light penetrates all the way to the bottom.
 
Hi all,
They are thriving, not dying. It’s an indication you have high light intensity on top, but low to medium light at the bottom.
If you look at leaf size and colour, the new leaves look stunted and very pale. It maybe some of the green colour has been washed out (in the photo) by the bright light?
the bottom half is all ok.
You can also see the two tone effect in the other photos, which makes me suspect that it is an iron issue.

cheers Darrel
 
Wow. Thank you people, that's reassured me quite a lot. Either way. I have started dosing the ADA Green brighty iron fertiliser along with green bright mineral, and neutral k as I previously was already doing.

I've started getting diatoms and little bits of algae showing up now, but this is all normal I suspect for a 7 day old tank.
 
Polysperma and arcuata are colouring up as they are supposed to do, growing in good light. Polysperma will likely stay only a little coloured, but your arcuata will likely gat a much more intense colour.
The macrandra 'green' I know of, tends to grow a bit yellowish - often even slightly pink - in newest growth, grown in good light. It actually present itself very well in a group mixed with the standard red macrandra.
The orange tips on your Rotala 'bonzai' says that you have a good level of light.
I too find the plants a little pale, though - so fertilisation, especially regarding iron, is probaply a little low. These are quite fast growing plants, therefore consuming quite a lot of fertiliser.
Extremely concise and nailed everything as I am seeing it in real life. Thank you kindly! I have started adding green brighty iron as of today, along with green brighty mineral and green brighty neutral k as I was previously doing.
 
I am showing pics of my Hygrophila polysperma and Ludwigia repen which share similar observation OP reported. I have medium light at top (60-80 PAR) and low light at the bottom (30-40 PAR).

The two stems responded differently. Ludwegian repen is a medium light plant that shows redness and dense growth at top, but weak and thin growth at the bottom. Hygro polysperma is a low light stem that shows dense and pale top, and dense and green bottom. Since I dose macros and micros weekly plus chelated iron every other day, I don’t think iron deficiency explains the color and density differential, but more likely attributable to light intensity gradient and demand of specific stems.

If my light intensity is high from top to bottom, I don’t think I’ll see the same response.
 

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