Strange happenings

[nilo]

My aquarium has now been dosed to the EI principles (thanks to a forum moderator for the advice)for a week now, CO2 is showing a lime green on my drop checker, my lights are on for 8 hours a day and they are an arcadia stretch LED at 35watts (i have no idea what Kelvins or lumens this equals but it stretches across my 40inch length 19inch depth tank) but, my plants seem...well..meh. (see pictures) My anubias appears a bit wilted and going a strange colour at the edges, my crypts have a form of algae on the new shoots and some of my vallis is a strange browny green colour.

Thoughts on what I'm missing would be great,

Thanks.

 

[zozo]

It sometimes hard to say if it's missing something, plants are a very dynamic lifeform reacting on different influences.. It could well be that the light still is a bit to intense for the time beeing. As i experience in my low tech tank with about 7 spieces of crypts and a few different types of anubias. These plants can take a rather long time from weeks to months to establish (One week is peanuts), they both need a rather well developed rootsystem to support new leaves.. So eventualy all energy they gather is for the biggest part concentrated on growing roots, which doesn't take as much energy as making new leaves.. And all this time you wont see happening much above the substrate with the crypts, them roots you wont see. But take a closer look at the anubias over several weeks if planted correctly on wood or rock, you will notice it growing new (White looking) roots, faster than it grows leaves.. This older roots also turn green in time.. If it has enough of that it will also grow leaves much quicker than in the beginning.

Those 2 spieces are sort of the diesels of the aquarium, they need a rather lengthy periode to warm up and get going.. In this periode the light intensity is more important than the time periode. So it could well be that you just need to dim it a bit for the time they still need to establish.. Once they have enough new green growth in the form of leaves, you can slowly up the intensity every week a bit more till a certain point and this will only help to get more new growth.. Those leaves are light collectors (solar panels), as long it doesn't have enough of these it can't do much will all the light you pump in.

Some may not agree, but in my experience if you find the right ballance in intensity a longer periode will only help to establish quicker. Much less light with a much longer periode. My low tech tank gets over 15 hours of light at the time and is barely growing algae. My high tech tank get 12 hours, but only 6 hours full potential since it is fully established.

So it's that sweetspot of finding the right ballance, but than again, it's not a constant sweetspot.. Since plants are a dynamic lifeform, this sweetspot changes while plants grow older. If the plants can't uttilize the light entensity they get into usefull energy algae will do that for you. After all they are also plants..

 

[roadmaster]

Amano shrimp,Otocinclus,nerite snails can be of some benefit IME.
They spend their time scouring the leaves and stem's of plant's and keep what little algae I have to unnoticible level's.
I do not use CO2 so maybe perhaps I should not comment, but from many I have spoken with, they often suggest placing the CO2 on timer to begin injecting an hour before light's on.
For new tank,they also often suggest a six hour straight photo period while tank is new and slowly adjust upward's afer a couple month's have gone by, and plant's are better established, and growing under some stabilization with regards to light period,CO2, fertilization scheme.

 

[nilo]

Thanks for the tips. I have my co2 on for 2 hours before the lights and it goes off an hour before the lights do. I'm probably just being impatient. Watch this space!