Water change killing anubias

[Alice B]

I did about a 70% water change a month ago and my anubias has been getting worse and worse since. Maybe i need to feed?

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

That's a gorgeously large plant! A.coffeifolia?

I shouldn't think it would hurt to try a liquid fertiliser. I don't know much about plant nutrition though I'm afraid, was just curious and also saw it was you posting, so popped in to say hi! @MattW3344 seems good with plants, hopefully he'll know, and hope you don't mind my tagging you, Matt

 

[MattW]

I shouldn't think it would hurt to try a liquid fertiliser

I'd try that as well. Personally I don't fert any of my tanks anymore. But for a water column feeder such as Anubias the water change might have removed a large amount of nutrients. Another cause may be it's being out-competed for nutrients by another plant? Looking at the photo it seems the majority of brown leaves are towards the bottom of the plant so light levels will be darker and the plant will use energy into leaves with the best access to light. There are quite a lot of possibilities so I'm not 100% sure I'm afraid

 

[Alice B]

I'd try that as well. Personally I don't fert any of my tanks anymore. But for a water column feeder such as Anubias the water change might have removed a large amount of nutrients. Another cause may be it's being out-competed for nutrients by another plant? Looking at the photo it seems the majority of brown leaves are towards the bottom of the plant so light levels will be darker and the plant will use energy into leaves with the best access to light. There are quite a lot of possibilities so I'm not 100% sure I'm afraid

I'll do some dead leaf removal and fertilize. I may cut it in half vertically, no other plants compete successfully with this one

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

I'll do some dead leaf removal and fertilize. I may cut it in half vertically, no other plants compete successfully with this one

Not sure about with anubius specifically, but I'd be inclined to leave the leaves alone until fully dead and ready to fall off anyway.

With outdoor and houseplants, it depends on the type of plant. Cutting back can promote new growth, absolutely, and encourage the plant to produce new shoots and leaves.

On the other hand, when a leaf is just has dead tips, or is still in the process of dying, the plant can still be drawing nutrients from that leaf back into the main plant, to put into pushing out new leaves.

With a slow growing, low light plant like anubius, I'd be inclined to think the latter is the likeliest, and wouldn't snip off leaves unless I absolutely had to, or they were fully dead and already lots of healthy new growth

 

[Alice B]

That makes sense, thank you

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Taking Buddlea as an example - it can be cut right back almost to the ground, because it grows so far and readily, that it'll shoot up again in the Spring, and grow bushier and flower even better after a hard cut back. But try that on a succulant, and you'll almost certainly have a dead succulant.

A friend of mine who's a horticulturalist described the process of pruning and cutting back a plant, whether to shape it, encourage it to flower again, or cutting back fast growing, almost weed-like plants like buddlea so hard, promoting new growth by basically making the plant think "**** (FUPLIE!) I'm gonna die! Better put up some new shoots, quick!"

That was the best explanation a plant person gave to a plant dunce like me! Made it click for me. So how aggressively you trim back varies on the plant and what you want from it, and things like crypts can come back from nothing but roots, but I'd be much more cautious with a slow grower like anubius. Yours is big, so might well be fine! And I'd be tempted to snip off the fully brown ones too, since you have so many other leaves, unlikely to kill the main plant! But any with any green left, I'd leave alone.

Hope they pick up after some ferts! And it's good to see you here

 

[TwoTankAmin]

O know for sure a bare live rizome will put out new leaves. I also fertilize all my planted tanks wfter a weekly water changes. Depending ion the tank, the plants it contains and the fish load, I may use Tropica Premium or Specialized liquid and in a couple of heavily planted tanks with shrimp and snails I add as bit of SeaChem Equilibrium. I may also use a mix of any of those three things depending on the tank size, the plant load and the fish load.

I also use

The nice thing about these is th you can cut one into any size pieces you want. For big rooted plants I may use whole spike cut into 1/3s and I will push one piece under pot at about 120° spacing. I usually add the above every 3 months.

If one is a regular re-planter, you should not use the above as uprooting them will result in your earning an MBA (Mastered By Algae).