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From v1 #146 by popular request...



From: nfrank at parsifal_nando.net (Neil Frank)
Date: Sun, 25 Jun 95 08:33:02 EDT
Subject: Nutrient Deficiency Symptoms

Here is a table I adapted from
 Jacobsen, Niels. AQUARIUM PLANTS (1979). Blandford Press Ltd. 

It extends the information recently provided on the digest by David Whittaker
 about mobile and immobile elements.

Other useful information can be obtained from 
 Krombholz, Paul.  "Mineral Nutrition of Aquatic Plants, Part 1" 
 THE AQUATIC GARDENER (1993), V6 n5.

--------------------------------------------------
        COMMON SYMPTOMS OF NUTRIENT DEFICIENCY IN AQUATIC PLANTS
--------------------------------------------------
            Leaves to first
Element     show deficiency         Symptom
--------------------------------------------------

Nitrogen        Old            Leaves turn yellowish (*)

Phosphorus        Old            Premature leaf fall-off
                            Similar to nitrogen deficiency

Calcium                New            Damage and die off of growing points
                            Yellowish leaf edges

Magnesium        Old            Yellow spots (*)

Potassium        Old         Yellow areas, 
                            then withering of leaf edges and tips

Sulfur                New            Similar to nitrogen deficiency

Iron                New            Leaves turn yellow
                            Greenish nerves enclosing yellow leaf tissue
                            First seen in fast growing plants  

Manganese         (**)            Dead yellowish tissue between leaf nerves

Copper                (**)            Dead leaf tips and withered edges

Zinc                Old            Yellowish areas between nerves,
                            Starting at leaf tip and edges

Boron                New             Dead shoot tips, new side shoots also die

Molybdenum        Old            Yellow spots between leaf nerves,
                                then brownish areas along edges.
                                Inhibited flowering
------------------------------------------------------
(*)  The plants may also become reddish from the presence 
     of the red pigment anthocyanin.

(**) Although Jacobsen does not differentiate between new and old leaves, 
     David Whittacker reports from a hydoponics book that boron, calcium,
     copper, iron, manganese and sulfur are immobile elements and whose
     deficiencies affect new leaves.
- --Neil




Dave Gomberg, Experimenta      San Francisco CA USA   gomberg at wcf_com