Dying plants ..

[Brendanpat]

I will all but guarantee improved plant growth if my suggestions are followed. I have seen this too often in my 30 years of low-tech planted tanks. I have zero GH/KH water, which of course means no calcium or magnesium. I do not add these aside from the fertilizers I use. I have lush growth from my large swords using Flourish Tabs and Flourish Comprehensive Supplement. I used to use Equilbrium (plus the liquid) to up the macros, but after a marine biologist questioned me as to the impact on fish, I stopped, and went to using the Flourish Tabs replaced every 3 months. The swords are still thriving, and that was 7 or 8 years ago.

The light was an issue here, it is not adequate and this is largely the spectrum. Removing the beneficial floating plants is not the answer. I know I consider fish first, plants second, and the floating plants definitely make the fishes' lives easier. But they should not impact the lower plants if the light is adequate, and with sufficient fertilizer/nutrients.

I will just post some photos of my tanks over the past 10 or so years, the swords do not look like they are starving or failing to me. I have heavy floating plants, zero GH, and used Flourish Tabs and Comprehensive liquid.

Wow ,wat a jungle !They look fantastic. Maybe one day I mite have something near that I hope

 

[Brendanpat]

I think the light was definitely a factor ,plus the position of it directly over the floating plants . It's more to the front now and shining top and bottom of the tank . I'd never remove my floating plants . The fish love them and before I had them I couldn't control algae . In this picture it mite be my imagination but the tips of them look greener and as if they mite grow ,after only 2 days . So time will tell

 

[Byron]

Don't be in a hurry. I have found that after a fairly significant change, such as the lighting spectrum, or intensity, adding this or that fertilizer, etc, it takes a couple weeks (usually) for plants to respond. Each aquarium is different too, but the basic premise is the same with a bit of tweaking perhaps.