Need Help With Plants! Whats wrong?

[JMJ99]

This is my planted 10 gallon. The plants don't look very well and I have no idea what I'm doing wrong or what I need yo do to get them looking health... any help will be a big help!

[Ogre44]

What's your substrate?
Are you using fertilizer root tabs?
How about liquid fertilizer?
What kind of bulb are you using for light?
What's its output spectrum?
How old is it?

I'm guessing that there aren't enough nutrients in your tapwater and you need to add some fertilizer to the tank.
I like Flourish Comprehensive and dose my tanks 3 times a week.
The other culprit is probably a light with the wrong kelvin temperature for plant growth, ideally you want around 6500k or a daylight bulb with peaks in the red and blue areas of the spectrum.
If you do have a plant bulb it might simply be old, they're only good for plant growth for a year and a lot of people say only 6 months.
If your 10 gallon has the standard T8 fluorescent tube you can get a "Plant & Aquarium" bulb from Home Depot or Lowes for less than you'll pay at the lfs.

[TrailerParkFishTanks]

I don't have all the info but your third picture has the plant leaning towards the light. The first and last picture have some browning on the leaves. I'd lean toward your light system but thats just a guess. I use flourish excel for plant food it works great. Do you have a water softener or anything?

[JMJ99]

I am not sure on what type of substrate I have, I threw the bag out, but I know I got it from PetSmart. And I do use Flourish as well. What would cause the holes in the plants? Would it be from to much light, or to little light? I will try getting a new bulb. If I leave the light on for 12 hours straight every day will that fry the plants?

[linuxrulesusa]

If you moved the plants, or changed the lighting, then sometimes the leaves will 'melt' and then grow back, especially with crypt type plants.  If there are not fish to supply nutrients via their waste, then you definitely need to supplement fertilize.  In that case it could be a nutrient issue as mentioned above.  How long have you had the plants?  Any changes in lighting or tank setup recently? 

[Ogre44]

I see swords, watersprite or Indian fern, and some kind of stem plant.
Is your flourish the Comprehensive or the Excel?
Comprehensive is fertilizer and Excel is a liquid carbon additive.
12 hours a day on your light won't hurt your plants, but if they don't have enough nutrients to photosynthesize for the full time they'll stop and algae will take advantage of the "extra" light.
The holes are due to damage to the plant, most likely through parts of them dying as the plant tries to keep the best functioning parts alive.
Try a new bulb and let us know how it works out.

[Helloitsme]

If you're doing water changes with a Gravel Vac, don't vac the gravel. It disturbs the roots.

[JMJ99]

Okay guys. Here we are a few or so later and this is where we are at. I have attached pictures I took this morning as well as the light bulb I put in there. There are two of them as well. I have been turning the light on at 7am and turning it off around 10pm. I do weekly water changes or sometimes every other week depending on if I'm busy. I have been adding Flourish about 3 times a week. The plants still are looking rough! What do I need to do?!?!?! I have read a few things saying not to do water changes and to not leave the light on for more than 4 hours at a time. I am a typical broke college student so I do not have the money to go spend an ungodly amount of money on a high tech lighting and what have you system. I just want this 10 gallon to look lively and lush.

[linuxrulesusa]

When I was using CFLs I used this bulb: http://www.petsmart.com/product/index.jsp?productId=11740166

I don't know if you can see on the side of the box but it shows a color output chart and you notice the spikes in the red and other areas - especially the red spike will help the plants.

Often bulbs sold for regular lighting in your house aren't customized to have spikes in the color spectrums needed by plants.

I don't think you need to spend crazy money for a fixture...I just run a regular T8 on my aquarium but I've switched to the plant/aquarium bulb recently (Aqueon, I believe) that I found for $7-8 at Walmart and it has helped a lot.

[Ogre44]

I grabbed the CFL's I had on hand, and the daylight 18w I have say that there output is around 6500K and says that they tend toward the cool or blue look, but don't specify their color output in a graph so I don't know how good they'd be.
Again, is your Flourish the Comprehensive or the Excel?
Also, it will take a little while for the plants to turn around, they will grow new leaves and greenery not repair the existing damaged foliage.

[linuxrulesusa]

Also, it will take a little while for the plants to turn around, they will grow new leaves and greenery not repair the existing damaged foliage.

^ This is an excellent point.  If some of the leaves are really damaged or in poor shape you can prune the plants and just pull off the damaged leaves so they quit trying to maintain the bad leaves and focus on new growth.  I wouldn't pull off all the leaves at once though.

[JMJ99]

It is the comprehensive one. What are everyone's thoughts on water changes and how long I should have the light on for?

[Steve]

I'm far from an expert on plants, only had my plants for about 5 months now, but I have java fern, anubias and some other type of fern (not sure what it is) and I have my T5 6500k lights on 14-15 hrs per day, dose with flourish excel every other day, water changes 60% every 10 days and my plants are doing pretty well. Well enough that they are shooting new growth which I can prune and make new plants out of every other month now.

[Ogre44]

I leave the lights on for about 8 hours a day and dose the Flourish Comprehensive 3 times a week, but my tanks are more heavily planted than yours and therefore will use the available nutrients faster and have a shorter photoperiod.
I do 50% water changes once a week, but don't add the ferts until more than 24hours after the change as I use Prime and it will lock up metals and therefore your ferts.
I'd keep going for another week or two and see how it goes, do as linux suggested and prune the worst leaves off of the plants and see if that encourages some new growth.

[Steve]

Ogre I've looked at the Flourish Comprehensive myself before and didn't know if I should be adding that instead of, or maybe in addition to the Flourish Excel I already do?