Planting Advice

[Gavo]

I have a RIO400 fully cycled, its got about 2" of silica sand in it for planting.


I have never had any luck with plants, what would you advise for the co2 setup and plant feed, and even the full stock of plants.

There isnt a great deal of plants available where i live so most stuff will be from ebay, please link to what you think is best and doesn't cost to much.


This is the tank at the moment, not a lot going on but its very early days

Nearly 2 Weeks later

Thanks

 

[minnnt]

Welcome to the forum!

What lighting are you running on the tank? This will determine what kind of plants you can keep. Personally i have gone with low demand plants such as Anubias, various Crypts, Java Fern, Java Moss, Vallis, Amazon Swords, Vallis. I am not dosing ferts as of yet but i aim to be doing so soon. All seem well atm though, so i can't complain.

Have you had a look at the planted section? You can read for weeks in there!

 

[Gavo]

Thanks,
I have 2 juwel daylite tubes but i can change these for any other k tubes from the wholesalers if needed.

So I could keep some plants without a co2 kit? I would prefer that, I would hate for the PH to crash one day


Could i add some of the plants you suggested there and would they need any supplements to do well.

 

[minnnt]

All of these plants will grow fine without Co2. Your fish should provide enough nutrients for them to thrive. Once you have it how you like you can look into dosing fertilisers. Something like TPN+ and easy carbo would be fine. Calculate the number of ml's you need for your tank per week, divide by seven and dose daily so to get a constant even supply of the nutrients.

 

[SLIM]

TPN not TPN+.

TPN + is for high tech really not low tech.

 

[Gavo]

Thanks for the info.

I just ordered 50x Java Fern, and some Java Moss from ebay to start.
I will be trying to get some nice wood locally for the tank tomorrow, if i cant find anything its back to ebay

 

[minnnt]

When you say locally do you mean the woods/forest? I wouldn't bother buying some if you're wanting branch type pieces. If wanting roots then you would have to buy.

SLIM, why not the + version of TPN? I thought all that was different was trace elements and nutrients? Cheers.

 

[Gavo]

Im not off to the woods to find some random wood to stick in my tank


I will check out the fish/pet/garden stores and see what i can find, hopefully i will find something that looks good but living on a little island i probably wont.

 

[ian]

TPN + contain macro elements (Nitrate, Phosphate and potassium). The normal TPN just contains micros. Now, depending on lighting and whether there's a need for carbon addition determines of which of these you'll really need to bother with. As soon as a carbon addition is introduced, you'll need to think about dosing some extra nitrate and phosphate.

we'll need to know the wattage of your bulbs to determine whether you'll need some carbon addition.
thread moved to planted section.

 

[Gavo]

I have 36w 1200mm juwel daylite tubes.



Sorry minnnt i misread what you posted there, so its ok to find some nice branches in the woods, i presume making sure there not rotting and soak them for a long time and clean all debris from them?

 

[KkAaNnEe]

Arent the four foot T8s like 39w or something?

 

[minnnt]

I just collected a few pieces of wood on my travels. Make sure they're solid and remove the bark. I just chucked mine in and weighted it down with rocks.

Thanks for the info on tpn and tpn+

 

[minnnt]

So would i be ok dosing something like the easy carbo and TPN in a low tech setup? Would this make a difference or not?

Thanks.

 

[ian]

It's the opinion of many (including myself), that once a carbon addition is added to a tank, whether that be Easycarbo or the like, or pressurised C02, the tank becomes high tec (ish). Once these are added the plants will want and need more N and P, more than what the tank itself can provide, so we then add them ourselves. The one this that will 'drive' the plant to need a carbon addition is light. If the light is high, when the plant photosynthesises, it won't have enough carbon (the building blocks), to photosynthesise properly, hence why you will see browning in plants and dying plants.

Gavo, if this was my tank, i wouldn't dose anything but some trace (micro) elements once or twice a week as the light is quite low in the tank. Keep your eye out for any deficiencies and report back to us if you see any.

 

[minnnt]

It's the opinion of many (including myself), that once a carbon addition is added to a tank, whether that be Easycarbo or the like, or pressurised C02, the tank becomes high tec (ish). Once these are added the plants will want and need more N and P, more than what the tank itself can provide, so we then add them ourselves. The one this that will 'drive' the plant to need a carbon addition is light. If the light is high, when the plant photosynthesises, it won't have enough carbon (the building blocks), to photosynthesise properly, hence why you will see browning in plants and dying plants.

Gavo, if this was my tank, i wouldn't dose anything but some trace (micro) elements once or twice a week as the light is quite low in the tank. Keep your eye out for any deficiencies and report back to us if you see any.

What do you suggest then Ian? Thanks for the great info!