[APD] Boron Deficiency

[James Folsom <james_folsom at gmail.com>]

>Reggie Bustinza asked:
>
>>> Is there any way to supplement boron
>>> exclusively?
>
>
>You can use boric acid or Borax. But don't use too much. Probably want
>to make a dilute solution and then add a few drops a water change time.
>Anybody know how much to use?
>
>I've suspected a B deficiency a few times but its always turned out to
>be a shortage of Ca.
>
>Steve
>

I had this problem and was able to solve it.  This link is to one of
Steve's questions/notes on this matter as well.

http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plants/month.9801/msg00484.html

My notes on this matter are not very good, it's one of my
shortcomings, but this is what I remember. In my case I had amazon
swords and chain swords that were producing white foliage and all the
plants were growing slowly except the hygro. There was little
pronounced curling, But I finally concluded it was boron that was
causing the problem because I had plenty of everything else.  So I did
some research and found Steve's earlier musings, and a lot of stuff
dealing with agricultural plants.  I used borax, and somehow came to
this dosing scheme.

I took 2.2g of borax (Na2B4O7X10H20), and dissolved it in 250 ml of
deionized water. I'm a graduate student and used reagent grade borax,
that was no longer needed around the lab, actually it was many years
old.  I don't know how good a quality it needs to be for fish.  In any
case I applied  1ml/10L of water in the tank, and then the same to
change water there after.

The damage done by boron deficiency is permanent, but within a few
weeks the plants were throwing healthy green leaves and growing quite
well,  The tanks pretty much became jungles after that.  And I was
glad I solved the problem.
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