iron question

I noticed an interesting event the other day that may lead to some
answers. I have a 29 gal. heavily-planted tank. I've been doing
weekly water changes and adding trace chelate mix once a week. Plants
seems to be growing steadily (including the swords) but the leaves are
quite pale. This has been going on for a couple weeks until I decided
to double my trace mix by adding increasing the frequency of dosing to
twice/week. By the end of the week, my swords started developing
brown spots on the leaves and stems. The spots rotted and left holes
in the leaves. So I backed down to my once/day routine, and no more
spots occured. The chelated mix that I used was iron-riched.

It seems that too much iron (or whatever's in my trace mix) is causing
the spots. Most people are concerned of adding too little, and wanted
to add more and more. But in reality, plants only need small amounts
of elements to grow, and putting in too much can cause a poisoning
effect. I would recommend those who have trouble with brown spots to
back off on the trace elements and see if things improve.

hope that helps.







Ben wrote in message ...
Hey all,

Was wondering something the other day. Now I know that to keep
plants happy in a tank you want to keep trace amounts of iron in the
tank. Now here is the thing, the house I live in was built in 1923 and
has old iron pipes. Now is there going to be enough trace iron in the
water or am I going to have to add it. just wondering


Ben