Newbie.

[AKGrown]

Hello! Since putting a plant in my tank i have seemed to have ammonia issues. Now I wonder if perhaps what I was doing for care was not enough. I have an 8,000k 15w aquarium lighting fixture and use the API plant "food" can anyone tell me if this is sufficient? I originally had a bamboo plant that looked sad in a hurry. Then I added micro sword i believe (or some other grass like plant) petco never seems quite certian on anything. soon after I added some ferns who never took off and were removed. Later on I added some small ("assorted") plants to the tank from my LFS they have small leaves on the bottom of their stem and branch off into larger leaves at the top with serraded edges and a large plant whose leaves extended from plant base upwards with no stem. If anyone has any advice i'm sorely lacking knowledge on this subject. Also on a side not I only have about 10 lbs of gravel in the bottom of the tank. I really want to switch to something else for my bottom layer but i'm not sure how to do that without totally shocking my already stressed fish

Tank = 20 gallons

 

[Ben M]

hi, you have quite low lighting, 0.75 watts per gallon. do you have pics of the plants, as many of them don't sound aquatic. what size is the gravel that you have, and how deep is it? you can change the substrate, but it may not be necessary, unless you prefer a different substrate. also, i would use a cheaper fertiliser such as TPN+ as, as others can get quite expensive.

 

[AKGrown]

hi, you have quite low lighting, 0.75 watts per gallon. do you have pics of the plants, as many of them don't sound aquatic. what size is the gravel that you have, and how deep is it? you can change the substrate, but it may not be necessary, unless you prefer a different substrate. also, i would use a cheaper fertiliser such as TPN+ as, as others can get quite expensive.

I dont have pictures of the plants I moved them all to my 2.5 gallon tank housing my infant snails. I am hoping to start anew. I want to first see if my ammonia levels go down to rule out any other issues that could potentially be causeing it. I purchased all of my plants from the aquatic section of my local petco. If you have any suggestions on what to do about my 1.) Lighting 2.) Plant Selection and 3.) a good base so that my cory cats can have something a bit easier on them, I would be more than happy to accept them! I don't have to much in my area, Alaska isnt known for a huge variety I have a petco and a local store and that pretty much sums it up if you have an online site that you are familiar with I'd love it if you'd share!! Thanks So Much!!!!

 

[PDSimon]

If you check out the info on the beginners section, there should be a list of beginner plants, and another list of plants with descriptions too. I recommend checking out tropica and the green machines website too. You'll find pretty much every plant with information on how difficult it is to grow, if it needs certain pH etc

theres also info available on the route you want to go down. Do you want the low tech, low light, no c02, minimal ferts or high tech, high light, co2 etc?

 

[AKGrown]

If you check out the info on the beginners section, there should be a list of beginner plants, and another list of plants with descriptions too. I recommend checking out tropica and the green machines website too. You'll find pretty much every plant with information on how difficult it is to grow, if it needs certain pH etc

theres also info available on the route you want to go down. Do you want the low tech, low light, no c02, minimal ferts or high tech, high light, co2 etc?

Thanks so much I will look into those sites!