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tonina fluviatilis rotting

tanker

Member
Joined
23 Feb 2008
Messages
102
Location
Malaysia
hi all, need some help. my plant was growing well... it was under a light too high, however had some algae problem. so i lowered it. but after a week plus or so, it starts to rot. the leaves would just disintegrate. other plants were doing fine. it just wouldnt grow. at the same time i've also changed the position of the filter outlet and CO2 diffuser.
now i've just changed it back to the original position. could it be because the plant were used to the high light intensity, therefore when i lowered it, it couldnt cope? cant really think of other reasons
 
Tonina fluviatilis is a very fussy plant but give it what it wants and it grows like a weed. IME it likes a very low KH of 3 or lower (never use baking soda to raise the KH) with plenty of CO2 and ferts. It likes high light as well. As far as substrates go I use just Akadama and it grows fine.

Could be just the light. See how it goes now you've lowered it again.

James
 
One thing about stem plants and in specific tonina. Now i've messed up the tonina, the leaves look ugly and unhealthy. given the right condition, will these ugly leaves it recover? or, i need to remove these leaves and then let the new leaves replace it?

if i have to remove it, should take out everything and replant the top part? or i can just pick away those leaves without replanting it. will the new leaves grow in its old place?

i've reduced my light, switched the position of my filter and diffuser to the old position. however there isnt much improvement of the tonina. it doesnt seemed to have grew much. therefore i'm trying to understand if my water condition is still not right or i shd do sth with the plant
 
Hi tanker,
I agree with James in that all the Toninas are difficult and are in the small category of plants that prefer low kH water. That means that if your water is higher kH it is less forgiving. As the plants grow their CO2/nutrient consumption increases and the flow becomes blocked due to higher mass. This plant will then suffer more than most.You may want to try increasing the injection rate to compensate.

Rotted leaves never recover and new leaves only ever emerge at the top so consider them gone. You can top and replant. You can often find the expression "a Tonina tank" and that's because you often have to adjust your tank parameters around this plants requirements, low kH and low TDS with high nutrients and CO2. Once you do you can throw a variety of Tonina species in the tank and they compliment each other aesthetically. Try cutting your tap with RO water to keep the kH low as suggested by James.

Cheers,
 
alright... thanks guys! appreciate it.
seems that i had some luck with the water parameter previously, it grew nicely until one day the luck ran out....
i'm off to do some reading on water KH! it could also be the nutrients as i've yet to find the dry ferts i want in malaysia!

the only stump removers i found was bonide and good thing i checked it before throwing it into my tank.checked pharmacies to no avail... its not KNO3... got to go search more DIY shops this weekend.
 
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