Tropical Fish Forum
Tropical Fish Keeping Help and Advice => Fish Tank Plant Advice => Topic started by: Fiona on April 21, 2016, 03:35:08 PM
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Finally having located the right plant, I have to write and say how pleased I am with the results.
Since I started keeping fish I have struggled with nitrates. My tap water nitrate is 40ppm and before a water change the nitrates are somewhere between 60-80ppm (its very hard to judge the colour).
I've tried numerous filter additives and mediums to address this and up till now they have all been less than satisfactory. HOWEVER I seem to have cracked it with the introduction of real amazonian frogbit. The shrimpery has got it growing on the surface and it's growing well AND it's reduced the nitrates in that tank.
As soon as it's grown enough side plants (although I might just buy more) I'm going to establish a colony of this plant in my 200l and see if they can fix the nitrate issue in there too. I'll grow it across the front of the tank as there are no plants there to shade.
Watch this space.....
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That's great news! :cheers:
I have some questions, if I may ... ? :)
- What have you done, if anything, to stop it drifting around your tank in the flow?
- Do the roots grow very low? Is it an attractive, as well as useful, addition to the tank?
- Probably hard to say, but how much of the total surface area do you feel you need to cover to make a difference to Nitrates?
- When yours has established, would you consider posting a small amount to me, if I cover your costs?
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I throw lots of this away so generally have some to spare.
There are two of my tanks where it won't grow because of the faster surface flow.
Root length is inversely proportional to nitrates, when there is plenty of nitrate the roots are short, but as nitrates reduce, the roots grow longer as the plant tries to take in more nutrients. They are useful indicators.
Of course, they do considerably reduce the amount of light reaching the plants below which might affect the growth of high light requiring plants.
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In the shrimpery I just guided it to a place where the plants don't need a lot of light, the roots eventually grew long enough to hook round plants growing upwards. I only added 9 plants, just checked, they cover about 1/8th of the surface.
It's not an unattractive look, quite naturalistic which I know you like Simon. I'm very happy with the effect.
I've put one test piece in the 200l to see how it grows and because my inlet pipe is facing diagonally across the tank it's floated into the opposite corner, in a spot just above a bunch of anubias, which is doubly perfect as the anubias were getting spots from where they're getting too much light after my hack back.
I'm glad Richard mentioned about the roots staying short in the presence of excessive nitrates, the one in the 200l has been there a week and has quite short roots still, now I know why!
If the roots grow too low I'll just cut them back to the rosette of leaves, that's the plan anyway.
and of course I'd send you some, that's if Richard doesn't do so first. :)
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I've got a few frogbit in some of my tanks, and I've noticed that it helps the nitrates. I have even seen test results from the puffer fish tank look more orange than the tap water "control" that I ran. For someone who had no experience with aquatic planting and had previously just gone as far as sticking 2 bunched plants in the sand, the frogbit on the top for the past month had given more orange in the nitrite results than the tap water control I ran, which showed a result of 40.
For me it only seems to make a difference in the puffer tank, which is fully stocked with fish that are very messy. The frogbit doesn't seem to make a difference in the tiger barb tank, which is <75% stocked.
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Well everything you have all said makes me even more interested in owning some of this.
I'd really appreciate it if someone wouldn't mind calculating a fair price, to bag up a small quantity and put it in an envelope for posting to Southampton.
I'll gladly send the money via paypal to cover any expenses.
If someone were to send me a PM to discuss this it would be fantastic. :cheers:
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I've got a few frogbit in some of my tanks
How many is a few Donna? It'll be interesting to make comparisons.
Well everything you have all said makes me even more interested in owning some of this.
I want to see how much difference it'll make to the 200l, mine is very understocked because of nitrate issues.
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Friday afternoon and early evening is my usual time for water testing, tank cleaning and water changes, so I'll count the frogbit I've got in each tank and let you know later. :)
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As a rough estimate, I certainly have less than 10 plants in each tank, so much less than 20% surface coverage. Probably closer to 10% coverage.
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Ta Donna. I intend monitoring my nitrates as the plants spread. I'll post the progress here, it would be great if you could do the same.
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Dear All,
A few months ago I stumbled across a similar plant and I fully agree with Fiona they have really improved my water quality. My plant wasn't described as Frogbit but 'dwarf water lettuce' but it certainly looks similar to internet pictures of Frogbit.
I also have some numbers that can back up Fiona's view. A while ago I got fed up with water test colour charts and got a cheap build project colourmeter, so have a set of accurate and repeatable readings of NO3 both before and after the introduction (will post on this meter separately as it has improved my water test dramatically)
Before Water lettuce/Frogbit I had a INCREASE in NO3 between weekly water changes of 13.2ppm and afterwards this has reduced to 5.5ppm per week, the water is running at an average NO3 level of 12ppm in a heavily stocked community freshwater tank (I am a fish person with plants, not a plant person with fish)
I am now harvesting most weeks, I weighed the plants I removed once and got 80gm of plant (a lot!), so if anybody would like some just ask.
I have also attached a couple of pictures to show the roots and there is also an extreme macro shot showing the hairs on the leaf surface that make them float, theses are not visible to the eye, the leaf just looks waxy
Regards, Andy the minion
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Hi Andy :wave:
How are you trying to attach the pics - using 'attachments and other options' below the reply box? It could be your pictures are too big, there is a size limit of 2012KB for any one pic and 4024 for all the pics combined. I often have to resize my photos to get them to attach.
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Hi Andy welcome to the forum :wave:
I got 'dwarf water lettuce' although I'd purchased amazonian frogbit and I had real issues with growing it successfully.
The amazonian frogbit however grows really well, it's been in my 200l for a few days now, I just need it to spread a bit. It's good to know somebody else is getting good results with these nitrate eaters.
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If you have a picture hosting place (Picasa or Photobucket) then you can copy'n'paste the picture address between IMG tags - or use the 'Mona Lisa' icon (the one below the B button) and paste into the space provided.
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Dear All,
A few months ago I stumbled across a similar plant and I fully agree with Fiona they have really improved my water quality. My plant wasn't described as Frogbit but 'dwarf water lettuce' but it certainly looks similar to internet pictures of Frogbit.
I also have some numbers that can back up Fiona's view. A while ago I got fed up with water test colour charts and got a cheap build project colourmeter, so have a set of accurate and repeatable readings of NO3 both before and after the introduction (will post on this meter separately as it has improved my water test dramatically)
Before Water lettuce/Frogbit I had a INCREASE in NO3 between weekly water changes of 13.2ppm and afterwards this has reduced to 5.5ppm per week, the water is running at an average NO3 level of 12ppm in a heavily stocked community freshwater tank (I am a fish person with plants, not a plant person with fish)
I am now harvesting most weeks, I weighed the plants I removed once and got 80gm of plant (a lot!), so if anybody would like some just ask.
I have also attached a couple of pictures to show the roots and there is also an extreme macro shot showing the hairs on the leaf surface that make them float, theses are not visible to the eye, the leaf just looks waxy
Regards, Andy the minion
ps 6 attempts cant attach pictures
Hi Andy, for some reason these weren't resized and were referenced as being 6000 pixels wide and 4000 high.
Was probably that windows edge issue we talked about in email. Feel free to email me those images and I'll add them for you.
:cheers:
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The amazonian frogbit isn't doing too well in the 200l. I think the fluorescent light bulb is too close to the water surface and the heat is scalding the plants :( . I know this flippin plant works, I just don't know what to do about the bulb, it sits about one and a half inches above the surface of the water
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Can you lower the water level at all?
I know in my tank there is about 1 cm between the top of the tank edging (not sure what it's called) and the maximum fill mark.
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Fiona,
I saw a bit of this happening with my dwarf lettuce, just a slight yellowing of leaves directly under an LED light bar. Its not excessively warm (3cm gap in my case) so I concluded it must be the higher light levels as the plants to the front and back under T8 (6cm gap) weren't suffering.
The fix might be to exclude the plant from directly under the lights, I have a skimmer and so I have attached fishing line across the tank just below the waterline to stop the plant drifting into it. In your case it might need to be 'swimming lanes' of clear water that you need.
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I have water at maximum level atm, I don't really want it lower, if I did it would mean the filter water output would be probably end up out of the water.
The bulb does get hot, I know this because I've stuck my arm on it a time or two. The plants are already situated as far from the light as possible. Hmmm what to do? ???
Andy I read that dwarf lettuce doesn't like condensation forming on it's leaves, it causes yellowing and shrivelling of leaves when under a light. I gave up trying to grow it.
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Fiona, That sounds reasonable the water droplets would probably focus the light and increase the intensity. I do have an area near the inlet where the leaves get splashed are coated but they don't suffer but its not under the LED's so it still sound like intensity.
You could try reducing the light on time or break it into shorter periods and see if it helps?
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Just tested the nitrates in my 200l and for the first time since the year dot the nitrates in there have dropped below 50ppm ;D I'm well chuffed. I did a water change last Friday but in the past a 25% water change hasnt made much difference.
Simon how did you on with the frogbit?
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Congratulations. :cheers:
During last weeks water testing one of my tanks had a nitrate reading lower than the tap water. ;D
I have to admit that I may be going a bit overboard with floating plants and now have quite a collection of different ones throughout the tanks, including water chestnut and a few other quite large ones. The puffers have been investigating the roots and seem to approve.
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I've been so busy with a new job i haven't had a chance to test.
The Jungle is the jungliest it's ever been.
I plan on giving the tank some TLC over the weekend and I'll see how the Frogbit has done and whether it's made a difference.
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New job - congratulations. :cheers:
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I spent an hour trimming The Jungle yesterday and did a large water change before adding the Otos from the quarantine tank.
I was amazed to see how well the Frogbit is doing, where it covered about one fifth of the surface when I added it, it now covers about a third.
I didn't have time to test Nitrates. ::)
I was bemused to discover loads of duckweed too, I thought I was so careful rinsing the Frogbit! :rotfl:
Oh well, I don't mind, it's green and natural so it can stay.
This morning I realised I'd accidentally nudged a socket and so the filter and heater had been left off overnight. :yikes:
Temp was 21.2° C so not disastrous. Hope the filter bacteria didn't suffer too badly... :-\
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I'd test water parameters tomorrow if I were you.
Boo to forgetting to test your nitrates ::)