**Warning: You are about to read a topic by a complete plant noob, prepare yourself for many questions and many more confused looks.**
As above, I am completely new to the world of plants, well I take that back, I have had plants in a tank you know those miracle bulbs from Walmart (hey boys and girls just throw me in your aquarium and watch me quickly grow into a thriving jungle). I can just hear you all cringing from here, as you may have guessed they didn't do well and I wasn't interested enough to care.
So you don't think me lazy, I have indeed read the pinned topics in this section and I must admit I know just about as much as I did before I read them. Not that they are bad articles, it's just that at this point it's all still a foreign language to me.
What I'm planning with a great deal of help from everyone here.
The tank: 20 gallon long (30"x12"x12")
The lighting: Beats the heck out of me, from what I've read I'm guessing this all has to do with which plant species I'm keeping.
The plants: Vallisineria and a moss of some kind. I know really specific huh. I'll try to explain the look I'm going for and hope for some suggestions.
The scape: I'm not sure how well I'll describe this but here goes. Some kind of plant substrate (any suggestions, there are WAY too many to choose from), the main scape will be rocks, kind of a mountain side tumbled rock look with a "path" meandering though. I don't know if I want the moss to grow on the rocks or kind of "tucked" in between maybe growing over a few. Along the back wall and partially on the sides I'd like the Vallisineria so that it forms a kind of canopy. Here's a very pathetic rendering of what I have in mind.
The gray would obviously be the rocks stacked to form kind of a mountain on each side, with the green spatterings being the moss. The red is the path going through (not sure if this will be bare substrate or pebbles of some kind). The green spikes in the back would be the val.
CO2, drop checkers and fertilizer, oh my: Now I'm really delving into foreign territory, I don't even begin to understand this stuff. I know I would like to avoid CO2 at this juncture, perhaps later but for now I'd like to keep it as low-tech as possible. I'm guessing the substrates for planted tanks have fertilizer in them, but I'm sure I'll need something to add just don't know what. Which brings me to the question of tests, I'll have the basic tests but are there any specific to planted tanks that I'll need, and if so what brand (US) do you recommend?
The rest: Unfortunately at this point I don't know what my PH is as I've just started ordering tank stuff, however, it should be rather low with soft water as the majority of the water here comes from snow melt. I don't want to say what fish I'll be keeping, but suffice it to say they prefer softer lower PH water and will benefit from the plants.
As I'm starting with just a tank I'm completely open to kitting it out however needed for the setup I have in mind. I just need a lot of help with what to get and where to go from there. It will be probably be around 3 months before this tank is set up as I want to get the main tank going first and I figured I'd just clone the filter. Speaking of which, any filter suggestions, the fish I have in mind can handle pretty much any water flow, so it's whatever the plants need.
I thank you in advance for any and all help and hope you'll be patient with my stupid questions. -Dawn
As above, I am completely new to the world of plants, well I take that back, I have had plants in a tank you know those miracle bulbs from Walmart (hey boys and girls just throw me in your aquarium and watch me quickly grow into a thriving jungle). I can just hear you all cringing from here, as you may have guessed they didn't do well and I wasn't interested enough to care.
So you don't think me lazy, I have indeed read the pinned topics in this section and I must admit I know just about as much as I did before I read them. Not that they are bad articles, it's just that at this point it's all still a foreign language to me.
What I'm planning with a great deal of help from everyone here.
The tank: 20 gallon long (30"x12"x12")
The lighting: Beats the heck out of me, from what I've read I'm guessing this all has to do with which plant species I'm keeping.
The plants: Vallisineria and a moss of some kind. I know really specific huh. I'll try to explain the look I'm going for and hope for some suggestions.
The scape: I'm not sure how well I'll describe this but here goes. Some kind of plant substrate (any suggestions, there are WAY too many to choose from), the main scape will be rocks, kind of a mountain side tumbled rock look with a "path" meandering though. I don't know if I want the moss to grow on the rocks or kind of "tucked" in between maybe growing over a few. Along the back wall and partially on the sides I'd like the Vallisineria so that it forms a kind of canopy. Here's a very pathetic rendering of what I have in mind.
The gray would obviously be the rocks stacked to form kind of a mountain on each side, with the green spatterings being the moss. The red is the path going through (not sure if this will be bare substrate or pebbles of some kind). The green spikes in the back would be the val.
CO2, drop checkers and fertilizer, oh my: Now I'm really delving into foreign territory, I don't even begin to understand this stuff. I know I would like to avoid CO2 at this juncture, perhaps later but for now I'd like to keep it as low-tech as possible. I'm guessing the substrates for planted tanks have fertilizer in them, but I'm sure I'll need something to add just don't know what. Which brings me to the question of tests, I'll have the basic tests but are there any specific to planted tanks that I'll need, and if so what brand (US) do you recommend?
The rest: Unfortunately at this point I don't know what my PH is as I've just started ordering tank stuff, however, it should be rather low with soft water as the majority of the water here comes from snow melt. I don't want to say what fish I'll be keeping, but suffice it to say they prefer softer lower PH water and will benefit from the plants.
As I'm starting with just a tank I'm completely open to kitting it out however needed for the setup I have in mind. I just need a lot of help with what to get and where to go from there. It will be probably be around 3 months before this tank is set up as I want to get the main tank going first and I figured I'd just clone the filter. Speaking of which, any filter suggestions, the fish I have in mind can handle pretty much any water flow, so it's whatever the plants need.
I thank you in advance for any and all help and hope you'll be patient with my stupid questions. -Dawn
