Plant question

[Asult316]

Hi. I have a 40g planted tank. I have a question about plant maintenance. I feel like all I'm doing is dosing my tank. I have moneywort, anacharis, melon sword, Java fern, Amazon sword and another I can't remember the name. Anyway every month I put in api root tabs and twice a week I'm dosing with seachem potassium, nitrogen, trace, flourish, excel. I have a chart with possible plant problems and how to treat and I feel like all I'm doing to dosing. Does anyone have any tips to see if I actually need to be dosing with so many different things? Lighting, I have currentusa satellite freshwater led+ Thanks for your help!

[Cliff]

You could try 3 or 4 weeks of no ferts and see what happens. Those are not all that demanding plants and unless you are going with high light and CO2, your plants will have a lowered ability to use available nutrients

[Compass]

You should be fine without any fertz. Our member Slaphppy7 has a 40B with the same lights as you. The only thing he does is root tabs. Nothing more. And he can't keep the plants at bay. lol

[Asult316]

I've tried nothing but tabs but my plants seemed to kinda slowly die offa so then I started treating with other stuff. I'm worried that if I stop all the other stuff it'll happen again. I use excel as a source of co2.

[talldutchie]

You should be fine without any fertz. Our member Slaphppy7 has a 40B with the same lights as you. The only thing he does is root tabs. Nothing more. And he can't keep the plants at bay. lol

That's a common but wrong conclusion. Tap water is different everywhere, in one place it may have a near ideal mix of trace nutrients, in others it will be massively out of balance.


@Asult: What you could do is post some pics, a bit more history as well. What water tests you have.

[Compass]

That's a common but wrong conclusion. Tap water is different everywhere, in one place it may have a near ideal mix of trace nutrients, in others it will be massively out of balance.

You make a good point. An oversight on my part. I forgot that Slap has that "magic water."

[Slaphppy7]

I rarely use the root tabs, too...mainly use them for new plants, then forget I have them

[Triton]

Out of the plants listed though, the swords are heavy root feeders, I can see using root tabs on them. But not sure about the others needing anything

You aren't running carbon in your filter are you?

[Asult316]

Latest water test: pH: 7.2 Ammonia: 0.0 Nitrite: 0.0 Nitrate: 40 Temp: 84
Not using carbon filter. I have aquaclear 70 with sponge and 3 bio max bags.
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[Slaphppy7]

Kind of off topic, but why do you keep the temp so high?