Real,artificial Or No Plants At All

[scotty]

just wondering what is best for a tropical tank, real,artificial or no plants at all,i would love to have real plants in my tank,but are they to hard to keep alive?

 

[Nick16]

real are of course the best plants. BUT, to make them flourish you will need some fertilisers, some decent lighting and preferably a source of co2. so if your a new comer it probably isnt worth it.

plstic are cheap and cheerful and give fish somewhere to hide. ideal for those who cant grow real plants for whatever reason.

Also it depends on your stocking as some fish like to eat and uproot real plants so its a nightmare.

 

[Kitty_Nin]

There are some real plants that are a cinch to grow. I had a banana lily that flourished under terrible lighting conditions. Perhaps fake plants, with a few easy-to-grow real ones thrown in. You'd get the best of both worlds.

Banana Plant<-This is the plant I had. It was under regular old incandescent lights, on about 12 hours a day, and I never fertilized it or did anything but tossed it in the water. After a few days bobbing round the tank it rooted, and a week or two later shot out stems that eventually arched across the whole top of my tank, with pretty lily pads on the ends.

Amazon Sword
Japanese Moss Balls
Onion
Watersprite
Anacharis

 

[bitteraspects]

You absolutely DO NOT need fertilizers, expensive lights, and Co2 in order to have live plants. Don't believe that for a second. There are many options for live plants that will grow without changing your current set up.
Plants like Anubias, Java Ferns, and different types of Mosses are extremely easy to keep. Almost no maintenence.

Live plants are definitely the best way to go. Not only will they provide hiding places for your fish, and add a great natural look to your tank, but they will also help maintain your water parameters as they feed off of fish waste and its byproducts (ammonia and nitrates).

 

[NinjaSmurf]

First off let me ask you what your light situation is, and how big your tank is. I have a thirty gallon tank, however due to the fact that it is two feet deep, I can not have real plants without some crazy lighting. So, perhaps figure out what you have, it might be easiest to find out first if you can have plants at all...

 

[Mayu]

If you decide to go the fake plant route... please get silk, not plastic. Plastic plants can rip off the protective slime coat layer on a fish leaving them open to infection. Silk plants are soft, and more natural. They're the next best thing to a real plant, though real plants seem to be the best.

personally, I've never had issues with my silk plants... I just started using live plants. not sure how I'm enjoying the live plant experience yet... but we'll see.

 

[craigieboy01]

Sorry to hijack your thread but i was wanting to know about live plants in my 23 litre tank when its cycled, so you dont really need to add anything to the tank to keep them? just keep the light on for 10 hrs enough? The lights in the Edge are 2 Hallogen lights with GU-4 12 volt lamps. Will the grow ok planted in sand?

 

[RadaR]

Sorry to hijack your thread but i was wanting to know about live plants in my 23 litre tank when its cycled, so you dont really need to add anything to the tank to keep them? just keep the light on for 10 hrs enough? Will the grow ok planted in sand?

If that were true then wouldn't we all save our money and not buy ferts/CO2 etc.
Depending on your lights (how much you have) and what plants you have (sort of), determines what you need to give the plants if anything.

 

[craigieboy01]

Sorry to hijack your thread but i was wanting to know about live plants in my 23 litre tank when its cycled, so you dont really need to add anything to the tank to keep them? just keep the light on for 10 hrs enough? The lights in the Edge are 2 Hallogen lights with GU-4 12 volt lamps. Will the grow ok planted in sand?

 

[RadaR]

Oh right. Fully stocked with fish and easy beginner plants, you might not need to add anything extra. I've seen an Edge grow Vallis and crypts with success. Mosses and Java fern would also be good. For an extra boost, you could add Easycarbo and Tropica Plant Nutrition+, at 1ml per day with 50% water change weekly.

 

[K-Holed]

I'll play devils advocate and go for no plants. I've seen some truly beautiful rockscaped tanks.

 

[waterdrop]

Good point KH, I've seen some beautiful rockscaped tanks too!

For a live planted tank I like RadaR's comments a lot. That's what I do, keep to low-light and keep my lighting hours down and add some liquid carbon and a small but balanced amount of the other nutrients plants need. There are a number of articles on TFF about which plants are easy (hint, java ferns, amazon swords, jave moss, anubias, crypt wendtii and many others...)

One problem for beginners can be that the new tank can actually be quite a sterile place for plants and therefor better at killing them than the established tanks our longer term members have grown used to. Some of the correct nutrients can go farther in this situation. Another problem for beginners is often that their tank circulation may not be quite good enough to entirely keep traces of ammonia from being slightly more concentrated in various pockets in the tank. Add a lot of light hours to that and you often get algae. Starting off with only 4 hours of light and very gradually raising the time if there's no algae is a good defense.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[Nick16]

You absolutely DO NOT need fertilizers, expensive lights, and Co2 in order to have live plants. Don't believe that for a second. There are many options for live plants that will grow without changing your current set up.
Plants like Anubias, Java Ferns, and different types of Mosses are extremely easy to keep. Almost no maintenence.

Live plants are definitely the best way to go. Not only will they provide hiding places for your fish, and add a great natural look to your tank, but they will also help maintain your water parameters as they feed off of fish waste and its byproducts (ammonia and nitrates).

can i see your georgeous planted tank with low light no ferts and no co2 then?

i didnt say plants wont grow i say they wont flourish. Big differance there my friend. Plants can eeek out an existence is some terrible conditions but who wants to see that. its far more appealing to have a planted tank thats healthy with most speacies reproducing and filling out. so how are things like java fern going to be healthy without a source of co2 and nutrients - something that forms the essential traingle of life for them.

 

[NinjaSmurf]

No offense but I think fish actually produce those things. I've had quite nice java moss and ferns with no CO2, just a bunch of fish and low lights.

 

[RadaR]

No offense but I think fish actually produce those things.

But not enough in tanks with medium-high light