why do my plants disintegrate?

[solomon415]

I am an extreme novice to keeping live plants in my tank so go easy on flaming me. I have been keeping live plants in my fish tanks for a few months. My plants get plenty of fluorescent light. I don’t have CO2 canisters but heard they’re not necessary if you don’t have a lot of plants. There is one kind of plant that I’m keeping in my 55 gallon tank that seems to start to disintegrate after a while. I don’t remember the name of the plant species but it is light green and dark green with a marbled looking pattern. Does anyone know what causes this?

 

[swede]

need more info..... do you have pics? what are your water parameters? wattage of lighting? substrate? fish stocked>?

 

[sostoudt]

I am an extreme novice to keeping live plants in my tank so go easy on flaming me. I have been keeping live plants in my fish tanks for a few months. My plants get plenty of fluorescent light. I don’t have CO2 canisters but heard they’re not necessary if you don’t have a lot of plants. There is one kind of plant that I’m keeping in my 55 gallon tank that seems to start to disintegrate after a while. I don’t remember the name of the plant species but it is light green and dark green with a marbled looking pattern. Does anyone know what causes this?

first you need to name the species. look at a pet site like liveaquaria and see if you can figure it out. it may not be a fully aquatic species, this would be the simplilist answer.

also what is plenty? we need wattage of bulbs and the number of bulbs.

what fertilizer are you using?
what substrate do you have?
what size is your tank?

 

[solomon415]

Ok thanks for the infro so far.. I'm having trouble ID'ing the plant online. I'll keep trying. Here is my setup:

55 gallon tank (long)
Black beauty substrate (blasting slag)
Stocked with about 12 fish total three cichlids about 3 inches long each and some schooling fish.
I have never used fertilizer.

I still need to find out what my light specs are..

 

[sostoudt]

is it this

or this

you can also check through these http://www.aquahobby.com/e_aquarium_plants.php

 

[I'mHooked]

Why don't you just post a picture of what you have?

 

[solomon415]

I will but I can't right now because I'm at work..

 

[solomon415]

What is it?

 

[velanarris]

A terrestrial bamboo.

Not aquatic. Which would be why they dissolve after (I'm guessing) a few months.

They probably catch some nasty brown or black algae as well.

 

[navygirl76]

like the above poster stated-that plant is not aquatic. be careful buying plants-alot of sellers will just sell anything-aquatic or not.

i have a planted 25 gallon that has christmas java fern, java moss, java fern and im going to buy some anubias soon- they are low light, easy plants that you practically cant kill lol. anubius comes in alot of species-you should check them out i think they would look great in your tank.. they come in all sizes and colors..

there is a planted section of this forum-you may want to read the stickies there on what would be good plants. the plants i keep dont even need ferts-but i give them a little just once a week and they look good..(i use seachem Flourish)