Discussion: Artificial Plants Vs. Natural

[Deleted member 149562]

I am a complete and utter failure where plants are concerned......apart from the thistles in the back garden that refuse to die no matter what I do to them. Houseplants, aquarium plants, herbacious borders in the garden.....nope....they refuse to co-operate.

I tried one last time with living plants in an aquarium a couple years ago. Quarantined them as per instructions, cleaned them....looked beautiful in the aquarium for about 48 hours. Then it was pest snail central...1000's of the little blighters all over everywhere. A month down the line the living plants, the snails...everything binned, aquariums sterilised and redone with artificial.

Yes they look lovely and pretty etc....but for convenience, no sleepless nights and cost....I am artificial all the way (apart from wood). Sorry.

 

[Colin_T]

Plastic plants were easy and frankly I cleaned them in the dishwasher from time to time so that they always looked really good.

I love it. So much easier than trying to clean the gunk off by hand

-----------------
I prefer live plants because they are natural, help keep the tank water cleaner, provide habitat and breeding sites for the fish, fish can eat them and that is good for the fish, and you can sell surplus plants. Having said all that, artificial plants have their uses in marine or brackish water tanks, in tanks with vegetarian fishes (the fish should be fed plant matter), and in tanks with big cichlids or other types of fish that regularly dig up plants.

If you have trouble growing plants, look at increasing light, adding a liquid iron based aquarium plant fertiliser, make sure you try true aquatic plants and not garden or marsh plants.

 

[Deleted member 149562]

This is my Aqua 80....just had a water change so a wee bit fuzzy and foggy, sorry.

Artificial mangroves with real spiderwood twigs intertwined, a piece of real mopani, all artificial plants, mixed white & black sand substrate

I never use the lights that come with the aquariums as they are, to me, far too bright and in the wild no fish has 100% sunshine and no clouds, so I use an 8" Nicrew MCR, the filter is an Aquael Turbo 1000...JBL S Pro heater is off, temp gauge top number is room, bottom is water.....literally water changed and filter service done 30 minutes ago.

So its an artificially scaped aquarium, but compared to some that I have seen, I do not think its that bad......at least its not day-glo...

 

[FroFro]

This is my Aqua 80....just had a water change so a wee bit fuzzy and foggy, sorry.

Artificial mangroves with real spiderwood twigs intertwined, a piece of real mopani, all artificial plants, mixed white & black sand substrate

I never use the lights that come with the aquariums as they are, to me, far too bright and in the wild no fish has 100% sunshine and no clouds, so I use an 8" Nicrew MCR, the filter is an Aquael Turbo 1000...JBL S Pro heater is off, temp gauge top number is room, bottom is water.....literally water changed and filter service done 30 minutes ago.

So its an artificially scaped aquarium, but compared to some that I have seen, I do not think its that bad......at least its not day-glo...

View attachment 142095

Thats a very nice looking tank! I have issues with artificial decor because they seem to wear out and the colors chip away fairly quickly for me. I tend to look at the aquarium decor at petsmart and petco and imagine how neat it would be to have a themed tank, but then I remember the 50$ I spent on a giant roman ruins aquarium piece and how it looked like booty just a few months later

 

[StevenF]

I have tried swords, watersprite, water wisteria, java fern, with no luck. The tank is too deep for proper lighting at the bottom using the hoods single fluorescent bulb.

How deep is it? While it can be difficult to judge brightness in a video, my guess is hat you have enough light. What I definitely do see is evidence of a magnesium deficiency in your tank. A healthy anubias will produce flat leaves. yours are wrinkled. That is typically associated with a magnesium deficiency and maybe a calcium deficiency. GH levels in the north eastern US are generally low. What is the GH level of your aquarium and how much water do you change out per week?

In general plants need 14 nutrients in the water to grow. If your water is missing just one plants may not grow.or will have damaged leaves and abnormal growth. And in my opinion these 14 nutrients can have a bigger effect on plant growth than light levels. Anubias might be the only plant that can deal with the possibly low nutrient levels in your water

 

[Grez]

You probably wouldn't line your house with plastic plants instead of real ones unless you had a practical reason to. Plastic plants are more expensive, they don't absorb nutrients, and they look tacky imo. You don't have to dose ferts or have a special substrate to keep live plants, just go for the easier choices like duckweed, anubias, etc.

 

[Deleted member 149562]

I think the choice of real or artificial is a personal choice and the choice tween the two should therefore be respected and not judged.

Those of us who use artificial do so for a variety of reasons, that does not (or at least should not) make us any less of a person.

Live plants are nice, I agree, but by the same token, artificial ones have also become far better quality and more "life like".

Artificial houseplants have also improved substantially too and those who have them, again, have them for a variety of reasons.

Don't judge people for having artificial plants when you do not know the reasons behind it, you should respect their choices.

 

[JazzyV]

Plant is addicting.

Try:
bacopa Carolina - very easy can practically grow in the dark, can grow out of your tank and have flowers, purple
Water sprite -easy low light … multiply ways to grow it, you can float it and it will branch out good for fry too, root system spreads out,lots of coverage for certain fishes that needs it to feel confident, if you don’t like a branch unhealthy just chop it off. Any branch can grow babies Amd you will have more than you know what to do with.
Scarlet temple- low light easy red plant, hot pink under leaf, so pretty…there’s no going back once you have a taste for plants…propagate just cut and stick stem down substrate, no co2 required for this red plant
Red tiger lotus- easy red nymphaea, beware root systems and don’t shade other plants or it will kill it, trim leaves that reach surface to avoid it thieving nutrients from other plants

if you plan it out, at a glance you can literally read your water parameters on the dot if you can recognize what you are looking at.. often times I find myself having at least 1 red plant to represent my iron..a potassium lover such as an Anubis family, when potassium is deficient you can see a certain holes in your leaf..tell tell signs…the red is easy ..iron. See simple right. Utilizing plant for our fish and our water can keep this thread open forever …that’s just a few things up there barely scratch the surface ..you really should give in and try what’s the harm? You can always go back to decor it will be there lol

 

[Grez]

I think the choice of real or artificial is a personal choice and the choice tween the two should therefore be respected and not judged.

Those of us who use artificial do so for a variety of reasons, that does not (or at least should not) make us any less of a person.

Live plants are nice, I agree, but by the same token, artificial ones have also become far better quality and more "life like".

Artificial houseplants have also improved substantially too and those who have them, again, have them for a variety of reasons.

Don't judge people for having artificial plants when you do not know the reasons behind it, you should respect their choices.

I do not lose respect or think less of you as a person for using plastic plants. I don't see how you gathered that from my post . I agree people choose plastic plants for a variety of reasons, and I simply stated the reasons why I prefer living plants. To each his own though

 

[FroFro]

I think the choice of real or artificial is a personal choice and the choice tween the two should therefore be respected and not judged.

Those of us who use artificial do so for a variety of reasons, that does not (or at least should not) make us any less of a person.

Live plants are nice, I agree, but by the same token, artificial ones have also become far better quality and more "life like".

Artificial houseplants have also improved substantially too and those who have them, again, have them for a variety of reasons.

Don't judge people for having artificial plants when you do not know the reasons behind it, you should respect their choices.

I agree, my uncle has some very nice plants from online that look like real silver tipped pathos vines and they are tough, his full grown Oscar hasn’t even ripped them apart yet! I feel natural plants can look nice and provide a better imitation of natural aquarium environments. However, to be honest, unless it’s a fish that eats plants for a living I think they are too simple to tell the difference or even care if the fake plants are of good quality. I believe that the fish most likely appreciate the shelter and security they can give. My first breeding pair of angels used to use a leaf hammock I had in their tank for their eggs, despite the many nice broad leafed Anubias I had.