cabomba question

[smartin78]

I am currently running a 5 gal heavily planted tank. I purchased what I thought were some fairly easy plants to care for. (This is my first planted tank) As I think Simpte mentioned to me, I was wrong about cabomba. It is evidentally a very difficult plant to grow. Well it has been three weeks now and all my plants look great. I just have a question about the cabomba. The tops of the plants are getting a reddish purple. I thought I read somewhere that, that is normal. Is this true or is the cabomba is dieing or is it missing something. I am noticing a few leaves on the ground but I think it is from the mystery snails. I put them in there until they get big enough from my 75G. They smaller than a pea when I put them in about a week to 2 weeks ago. They are now the size of a marble.

Here is my setup

5 Gallon
PH 6.4
AMmonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 20
GH and KH (not sure but plan on getting a test kit tonight)

I am using a white sand substrate.

My filter is an internal power filter with built in heater.

I keep the tank at 80F

The tank has an incadescent hood. I found a mini fluorescent bulb for it rated at 13 watts.

I have been adding flourish for a week now at about 1/2 recommended dose and just added flourish excel last night for the first time.

Inhabitants
2 cory cats
1 black molly and 6 fry (It was an unplanned pregnancy so she got shoved in this tank)
8 baby mystery snails

[Damon]

Its normal for cabomba to do that, especially with higher light levels (or as it gets closer to the light fixtures).

[smartin78]

Ok Thanks, Then it appears that it is doing well so far. I will keep my fingers crossed. This little tank is really taking off.

[MyraVan]

I now have my little 5gal planted tank set up too, as of last week. The substrate is plain topsoil covered with small plain gravel (gravel for alpine plants). Both were bought from a garden center, and were thus exceedingly cheap. The lighting is a flourescent desk lamp with 11W bulb. I have a tiny filter, and a separate heater. The heater, a 25W Visitherm, takes up quite a bit of space.

Plants are: crypt wendii, lobelia cardinalis, anubias nana, micro sag, and Marsilea quadrafolia (4 leaf clover). Also, temporarily, lots of hornwort to keep ammonia under control while the tank is sorting itself out. Residents are two snails, one apple snail (P. bridgesii) and one striped snail, which is some kind of nerite. The tank was set up 5 days ago, and the ammonia level is 0: three cheers for hornwort!

Right now it looks a bit of a mess with all the hornwort floating around, and with some extra stones holding down the bogwood which last time I checked still tried to float. It will look better when I've removed some of the hornwort and the rooted plants have started growing.

About cabomba: I also had some in my big tank, and it looked great for awhile, but then it fell apart. Now I have as background plants crypt balansea which is growing well, and, newly added, straight vallis & water sprite.

[smartin78]

I have a ton of hornwort floating in mine as well. I actually like the look it gives and it also is a great place for my fry to hangout. I was so surprised how fast it grew. I had a little peice maybe 4 inches at most. It has now started to fill the top half of my tank. My guess, if you laid it all our it would be about a foot and a half. I was thinking I would grow a bunch of it and feed it to my silver dollar but evidentally he doesn't like plants any more. I tried putting plants with him once before about 2 - 3 years ago and he devoured them over night.

[midiamin]

Unknown to most folks is Hornwort is a very bitter tasting plant so most fish will not consume it. Wondr if your dollar will eat the other plants?

[maxpayne_lhp]

It's okay. Well, but one bad thing is that the leaves of these cabombas are really nasty! They almost get my filer/prefilter stuck up and leave a lot of waste around the tank.