[rusticitas]

I had purchased a lovely bunch of Mayaca from an LFS about two months ago and it has just slowly withered away. I originally had it in a 10g, and my little dwarf honey gold gourami picked at it mercilessly. That withering, I understand. I saved several offshoots that were a nice, healthly green and put them into other tanks (varying setups, light levels, pH, etc). In all of them the main "trunk" will slowly darken and wither and there will be a couple of healthly looking, but very small offshoots, but when replanted they just go as well.

What gives? This did not seem like such a touchy plant. The LFS just had it stuffed into a tank for months and they're tank was definitely low-tech.

Is this considered a very difficult or delicate plant?

(BTW, I like to keep my tanks low tech, I do not use CO2 or get wild with fertilization. I have no other plants that are so picky.)

-Jason

 

[MiamiAG]

Jason,

What you describe appears to be necrosis and is typically caused by a nutrient deficiency. Can you provide us with a little more information on your aquarium such as lighting, substrate, fertilization, pH, etc.?

 

[ShaneSmith]

Maya as far as i know loves light. So maybe it just not the plant for your setup. I would put a jobes stick if you have any left and try to get it more light. Or put the plant in a put and get it up close to the light with a suction cup or something and see if that works.

 

[rusticitas]

I don't have any Jobs sticks handy (although my parent's might, they're green thumbs). The plants has been moved from tank to tank, dwindling in size.

It started off in my first aquarium, a 10g with pea gravel with laterite. I had been dosing with Fluorish Excel every other day and Fluorish every week and a couple of Plantabbs every 10-14 days. I was not very religious about that. The tank has an AH Supply 1x36W Bright Kit in one of their housings. I use an Aquaclear Mini filter.

Once it was fairly decimated I threw the really dead ones out. The few with some green shoots coming off I saved and distributed to other tanks. The only tank in which it seemed ok is my super low-tech 2g guppy jar. In that I use Eco-Complete and a desk PCF light (~6500/6700K) on about ~12hrs/day. No filter, no dosing. (Actually that tank has the healthiest plant growth of all of them, go figure). I say seemed becuase only the top parts and off shoots were green, it would stay "dead-ish" from the substrate to about 1/3-1/2 way up. If I cut off a green shoot and planted it, it would do the same thing. Weird.

I don't understand how it stayed so healthly at the LFS for so long, and they do not do anything special, just dump it in a tank. No CO2 (neither do I), no dosing, nothing. Weird.

 

[ShaneSmith]

That always been a phenominan (Sp?) for me. Maybe they are replacing it more than we know. Maybe they do something to our water we dont know about. But whatever it is they're plants that i think have been in there for a long time seem to always deteriorate faster when put in my aquariums. Maybe its too much shock in such a short time.