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Anubias leaf disease

6K views 8 replies 2 participants last post by  Byron 
#1 · (Edited)
Hello everybody,

Could anyone help me to identify what is happening to my anubias (and hygrophila as well)? See attached picture, please. The white powdery spot is spreading a little day by day, all the plants new growth looks healthy so far, and I am not sure if this is a lack of nutrients or a fungus. What do you think? I dose Seachem Flourish Comprehensive and Excel once a week, 5 ml per 55 gallons, also use root tabs, and the substrate is Fluorite. Ammonia, nitrites are zero, nitrates <20, Ph 6.8-7.0, PWC 25% weekly with Prime. The lighting and other parameters are recorded in my tank profile. I couldn't find any example of such disease online.
 

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#2 ·
Guys, now I am totally confused. I just took that anubias out and gave that leaf a good scrubbing, and the white spot came off! The leaf looks just like the other ones. What in the world does it sound like? Buildup of some elements? Why would it spread every day? I guess it's not a disease after all?
 
#3 ·
I think you've answered your own question. Seems to be particulate matter settling on the leaves. A few small snails would help.

Byron.
 
#4 ·
Thanks, Byron. Would you recommend manually scrubbing the deposits off the leaves periodically to help the photosynthesis or is it unnecessary? I have three nerite snails and a few smallish ones that traveled on plants, I guess, but they seems to be more interested munching on the driftwood. I suppose once the complimentary store snails multiply, they will take care of most of it?
 
#5 ·
I would want to be certain of what this is, and I can't tell that from the photos. Obviously eliminating the cause would be nice.
 
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#6 · (Edited)
The only thing I can think of is some extra iron that settles on the leaves because of the Fluorite, and I also added some cuttlebone for the snails recently. There is a lot of matter on other leaves, but it looks more like brown algae/diatoms (wipes relatively easy), not powdery white. I hope since this tanks is only 2.5 months old, maybe once it settles the brown stuff will go down. Sorry, I know my photos are horrible, I don't have a better camera right now.

Just thought of something else. I had an ick outbreak in this tank and raised the water temperature to mid-eighties for a week. This is when I started noticing the whitish spots. But the thing is, the temp was down to normal, and the stuff was still spreading. Oh well. Hope it's not very serious as long as there is nice new growth and the (only) fish is happy.
 
#7 ·
The only thing I can think of is some extra iron that settles on the leaves because of the Fluorite, and I also added some cuttlebone for the snails recently. There is a lot of matter on other leaves, but it looks more like brown algae/diatoms (wipes relatively easy), not powdery white. I hope since this tanks is only 2.5 months old, maybe once it settles the brown stuff will go down. Sorry, I know my photos are horrible, I don't have a better camera right now.
The powdery white is likely from the cuttlebone.
 
#8 ·
Okay, that brings me to another question: is there such a thing as too much calcium in a freshwater tank? Should I get test kits and which ones? Don't really want to mess with it too much. I know right off the bat that the water hardness is 140-150, alkalinity 40, and I only added half the cuttlebone to 55 gallons of water with these parameters. I hope I didn't overdose. The more I learn the more (and dumber) my questions seem. Thanks for your patience!
 
#9 ·
The only concern with the "hard minerals" as we term calcium and magnesium has to do with the fish; soft water fish suffer from the presence of hard minerals (this can vary somewhat with species) so it is always best to keep the water soft. Fish preferring harder water will usually not have issues with increasing the hardness.

Plants need calcium and magnesium as macro nutrients, and this is normally sufficient if the GH is around 4 to 5 dGH or anything above. Up to a point; some plants will not manage in very hard water.

A GH of 140-150 ppm equates to around 8 dGH, which I would term moderately hard. Cuttlebone is unlikely to alter this.

White dust is often (but not always) due to calcium, and dissolving cuttlebone might show as deposits, though this is just my surmise.

Byron.
 
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