Plants not doing very, could do with some advice

Thanks to loads of great help here, I set up a goldfish tank, which currently has four fish in it. Before anyone tells me off, I know they will outgrow this tank, and I'm already contemplating a pond

The tank is a 24" cube, which is tall enough to mean that I need quite strong lighting to have the bottom of the tank lit. This then gives algae problems. I added a fair number of plants, partly because I like them, and partly to help keep the algae down.

Set up until a week or two ago...

• Tank: 24"x24"x24" (200l)
• Filter: Cristalprofi Greenline (canister, can't remember which model, and it's a bit buried in the cupboard under the tank!)
• Substrate: Play sand, about 2" deep
• Decoration: 1 piece of mopani wood (I think it is, been many years since I bought it) and 2 pieces of spiderwood
• Plants: 2 x anubis, 10 x Java fern, 6 marimo moss balls lots of elodea and lots of vallis. I also add duckweed about once a week, which generally gets eaten quickly
• Lighting: 2 LED PAR38 6500K bulbs, placed about 6" above the water surface, on for about 15 hours a day
• Fish: 4 goldfish (1.5-2")
• Feeding schedule: Sinking pellets twice a day. Once a week a hatch brine shrimp and feed those instead of the pellets. As mentioned above, they also have duckweed to eat

There is a general algae problem. Not terrible, but I need to clean the glass every few days as it has a light covering of soft green algae. The main issue is the algae on the plants.

The vallis are growing well in that they are sending out loads of runners, but they are all poor quality, with semi-translucent leaves and rough edge...



By contrast, a bunch of the same batch of vallis that went into my tropical tank are looking healthy and green, although they haven't sent out any runners.

The elodea are spreading, but are also not doing so well. Some of them have bare stems...



I'm not sure if the bare stems are from the fish eating them, or if they are part of my general plant problem. Many others are growing, but are lying flat on the sand...



Again, I put some of the same batch into the tropical tank, and they are growing very well.

The anubis are growing well, putting out new leaves (probably because they are top of the wood, so are nearer the light), but like everything else in the tank, they are covered in algae...



On the advice of someone about two weeks ago, I cut down the photo-period to about six hours a day, and only feed the fish once a day, but I haven't seen any difference so far.

Anyone able to advise how I can rescue the tank?

Thanks

Forgot to mention that there is sand everywhere. I know it's the ideal substrate for goldfish, but it seems to fly around and cover everything in the bottom couple of inches of the water. Anything I can do to stop this, other than giving the fish a severe warning

Yossu said:

Thanks to loads of great help here, I set up a goldfish tank, which currently has four fish in it. Before anyone tells me off, I know they will outgrow this tank, and I'm already contemplating a pond

The tank is a 24" cube, which is tall enough to mean that I need quite strong lighting to have the bottom of the tank lit. This then gives algae problems. I added a fair number of plants, partly because I like them, and partly to help keep the algae down.

Set up until a week or two ago...

• Tank: 24"x24"x24" (200l)
• Filter: Cristalprofi Greenline (canister, can't remember which model, and it's a bit buried in the cupboard under the tank!)
• Substrate: Play sand, about 2" deep
• Decoration: 1 piece of mopani wood (I think it is, been many years since I bought it) and 2 pieces of spiderwood
• Plants: 2 x anubis, 10 x Java fern, 6 marimo moss balls lots of elodea and lots of vallis. I also add duckweed about once a week, which generally gets eaten quickly
• Lighting: 2 LED PAR38 6500K bulbs, placed about 6" above the water surface, on for about 15 hours a day
• Fish: 4 goldfish (1.5-2")
• Feeding schedule: Sinking pellets twice a day. Once a week a hatch brine shrimp and feed those instead of the pellets. As mentioned above, they also have duckweed to eat

There is a general algae problem. Not terrible, but I need to clean the glass every few days as it has a light covering of soft green algae. The main issue is the algae on the plants.

The vallis are growing well in that they are sending out loads of runners, but they are all poor quality, with semi-translucent leaves and rough edge...

View attachment 349834

By contrast, a bunch of the same batch of vallis that went into my tropical tank are looking healthy and green, although they haven't sent out any runners.

The elodea are spreading, but are also not doing so well. Some of them have bare stems...

View attachment 349836

I'm not sure if the bare stems are from the fish eating them, or if they are part of my general plant problem. Many others are growing, but are lying flat on the sand...

View attachment 349837

Again, I put some of the same batch into the tropical tank, and they are growing very well.

The anubis are growing well, putting out new leaves (probably because they are top of the wood, so are nearer the light), but like everything else in the tank, they are covered in algae...

View attachment 349838

On the advice of someone about two weeks ago, I cut down the photo-period to about six hours a day, and only feed the fish once a day, but I haven't seen any difference so far.

Anyone able to advise how I can rescue the tank?

Thanks

Click to expand...

Is the sand capping anything like aqua soil? If not are you using any root tabs?

Crunchycrouton said:

Is the sand capping anything like aqua soil? If not are you using any root tabs?

Click to expand...

No, just plain sand with noting beneath.

Not using root tabs. Did try some fertiliser, but stopped that when I saw it didn't help, and might have been contributing to the algae problem. Haven't noticed any difference since I stopped using it.

Yossu said:

No, just plain sand with noting beneath.

Not using root tabs. Did try some fertiliser, but stopped that when I saw it didn't help, and might have been contributing to the algae problem. Haven't noticed any difference since I stopped using it.

Click to expand...

I use osmocote plus I just put them deep into the substrate around 5 inches from each other throughout the tank or just where the plants are. I think you plants just need some fertilizer

Reduce the lighting period to 12 hours per day.

The Vallis with rough edges could be bites from the goldfish and doesn't look like a disease.

Crunchycrouton said:

I use osmocote plus I just put them deep into the substrate around 5 inches from each other throughout the tank or just where the plants are. I think you plants just need some fertilizer

Click to expand...

I tried using some fertisiler (Tropica Premium Nutrition), but didn't see any difference. Would root tabs be a better option?

Colin_T said:

Reduce the lighting period to 12 hours per day.

Click to expand...

As I mentioned at the end of my first post, I reduced it to about 6 hours a day a few weeks ago, but nothing has changed. The plants look the same and the algae is the same. I'm not sure how to strike the balance between enough light to keep the plants healthy and not too much light to give the algae free reign.

Colin_T said:

The Vallis with rough edges could be bites from the goldfish and doesn't look like a disease.

Click to expand...

Hmm, didn't think of that, although there are a lot of vallis now (all around 2" tall, bunches pooped up over most of the tank) and they all look like that. If it were goldfish biting, I would expect it to be more random. Also, a lot (most?) of the vallis leaves are semi-translucent (see the first pic I posted above) which mad me wonder if it was something lacking in the environment.

Thanks to both of you for the replies. Any further advice would be very welcome.

It's your lamps.

While the light you have provide a part of the spectrum you need, it misses a good part of red. Probably helping to promote algae.

Plants primarily utilize wavelengths between 400 and 700 nanometers (nm)

Blue light (around 440-500 nm) promotes healthy leaf growth and development.
Red light (around 660-680 nm) encourages flowering, fruiting, and overall vegetative growth.

Change that for a real full spectrum Led So you be able to actively control period and intensity.

@MaloK Hmm, interesting. I specifically bought those bulbs as they are (as far as I understood) full spectrum. I've used them on terrestrial plants before and always had good results.

Do you know how I'd go about finding the right bulbs for my tank? I'm no expert in this field. I originally picked the ones I'm using by their colour temperature (6500K), as I was under the impression that the higher that number, the closer they mimicked daylight, and so better for the plants. Any advice would be welcome.

Thanks

6500K is the usual recommendation for planted tanks.

Essjay said:

6500K is the usual recommendation for planted tanks.

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Now I'm even more confused! Please can one of you clarify this for me? Are these lights OK or not? If not, how do I work out what to use?

Thanks

Yossu said:

@MaloK Hmm, interesting. I specifically bought those bulbs as they are (as far as I understood) full spectrum. I've used them on terrestrial plants before and always had good results.

Do you know how I'd go about finding the right bulbs for my tank? I'm no expert in this field. I originally picked the ones I'm using by their colour temperature (6500K), as I was under the impression that the higher that number, the closer they mimicked daylight, and so better for the plants. Any advice would be welcome.

Thanks

Click to expand...

If they are advertised as full spectrum, they should be pretty good, natural daylight is between 5000 and 6500 Kelvin, With 5500 considered as the closest.

Are they dimmable ? You could play with the intensity, or install them higher. or cut back to only one.

MaloK said:

Are they dimmable ? You could play with the intensity, or install them higher. or cut back to only one.

Click to expand...

No they aren't dimmable.

I can make them higher, but then I lose intensity down at the bottom, where most of the plants are. Same with using only one. Won't the plants suffer even more with less light?

Yossu said:

No they aren't dimmable.

I can make them higher, but then I lose intensity down at the bottom, where most of the plants are. Same with using only one. Won't the plants suffer even more with less light?

Click to expand...

Good chances algae will suffer first.

Can you post a picture of the whole setup, so it gives an idea on how illuminated it is.

Sure, here you go.

Bear in mind that my photography skills are on a par with my fish and plant keeping skills!