Any guidance welcome

My mother used to live in United Utilities area so I used her postcode.

First I entered her postcode here

This gave me the 'summary' page in the image.
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Her postcode gives her hardness as 6.51 degrees Clark. This unit is not used in fishkeeping, but we can convert it to the two units which are used. Tell us the number for degrees Clark, please.




I had a plant arrive like that a couple of weeks ago. I used a strong pair of scissors to cut the plastic basket into tiny pieces to free the roots. Any still caught can be gently pulled free. The yellowish stuff then has to be removed; I use a straightened out paperclip under a trickle of cold tap water to get the bits stuck between the roots.
The anubias will have to be attached to something such as a rock, piece of wood or plastic ornament. it cannot be planted in the substrate as the rhizome will rot. The rhizome is a thick stem like thing which has leaves growing out of one side and roots from the opposite side.
ok great i’ll do that! i can get a rock to attach it to. it’s 3.5 - thanks for ur help!
 

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That anubias is too big for your tank. You are looking for varieties that contain the word mini or nana or petite.

I steer clear of marimo moss balls. They are actually a type of algae that grows in a ball form, and I am convinced that having them in my tank seeded it with algae and I had little tufts growing here and there. There are of course other reasons why algae may appear but I just think that is what happened. I may be wrong and others may disagree.
 
Slow down. You've gone and got more plants without having any success in growing the plants you already had. No idea what the biorb light is like but lights that come with packages, particularly "lifestyle" ones like the biorb are often not up to much. I would advise trying to grow the elodea, the java fern and christmas moss first. If they work then you can add more plants if you've got the room. take the other plants back if you can.
 
gosh i feel like a plonker, i watched some you tube channels on what i’m best doing and the msg was to get lots and leave them alone. clearly i have seen the wrong thing.
one came in the post and the others are from my fish store so i could give them back. i highly doubt they will give me my money back but who knows they might.
 
Watch YouTube videos by all means, but don’t assume they’re giving you good advice. :)
 
Lots of plants are good generally speaking but they won't grow if there isn't enough light. Don't worry about it, we all make mistakes when we start out.

The pics I've seen of the biorb flow show a small round light in the middle of the lid. Some led lights have a higher angle of dispersion than others, so even a small round light can give good lighting throughout the tank, other led lights have a lower angle of dispersion so you'll only get decent light in one part of the tank. I would start out attaching the java fern and the chrstimas moss to bit of wood or rock and placing these directly under the light, perhaps one either side of the uplift tube. then put your elodea in floating. The elodea is a fast growing plant so will suck up a lot of nutrients and hopefully keep algae at bay. The moss and java fern are lower light, slower growing plants and so probably won't mind being in the shade under the elodea, and in time you might find that they will grow fine in the less brightly lit parts of the tank away from the light unit, but you'll have to try it and see if it works.

Give it a go with the three plants I've mentioned and see how it goes for a few months and then report back on progress.

Your lfs should give you a credit note if they are reasonable. If they don't then don't go back there.
 
3.5 deg Clark = 2.8 dH and 50 ppm. Those are the two units used in fish keeping and fish profiles will use one or other of them. You have very soft water.



So we all know what the tank is, this is it (though it does come in different colours and with different lights)
 
Lots of plants are good generally speaking but they won't grow if there isn't enough light. Don't worry about it, we all make mistakes when we start out.

The pics I've seen of the biorb flow show a small round light in the middle of the lid. Some led lights have a higher angle of dispersion than others, so even a small round light can give good lighting throughout the tank, other led lights have a lower angle of dispersion so you'll only get decent light in one part of the tank. I would start out attaching the java fern and the chrstimas moss to bit of wood or rock and placing these directly under the light, perhaps one either side of the uplift tube. then put your elodea in floating. The elodea is a fast growing plant so will suck up a lot of nutrients and hopefully keep algae at bay. The moss and java fern are lower light, slower growing plants and so probably won't mind being in the shade under the elodea, and in time you might find that they will grow fine in the less brightly lit parts of the tank away from the light unit, but you'll have to try it and see if it works.

Give it a go with the three plants I've mentioned and see how it goes for a few months and then report back on progress.

Your lfs should give you a credit note if they are reasonable. If they don't then don't go back there.
so the elodea java fern and hair grass and unknown grass small thing came weighted so they are just sat among the media. i’ve wrapped the roots of the too big anubias around a marble stone i have currently and will just see how it goes. ill stick the christmas moss on the stone in the centre so it gets good light. thank you.

the cycling stuff is still confusing me. i’ll reread what u have sent. so much to take in. i really thought a family run store specialised in aquatics would give the right info! (there fish room is massive)
 
3.5 deg Clark = 2.8 dH and 50 ppm. Those are the two units used in fish keeping and fish profiles will use one or other of them. You have very soft water.



So we all know what the tank is, this is it (though it does come in different colours and with different lights)
ok yes very soft! what does this mean for fish choices? when in however many weeks i’ll be able to get some
 
get some liquid fertiliser like tnc lite
so the elodea java fern and hair grass and unknown grass small thing came weighted so they are just sat among the media. i’ve wrapped the roots of the too big anubias around a marble stone i have currently and will just see how it goes. ill stick the christmas moss on the stone in the centre so it gets good light. thank you.

the cycling stuff is still confusing me. i’ll reread what u have sent. so much to take in. i really thought a family run store specialised in aquatics would give the right info! (there fish room is massive)
Take the weight off the elodea and try and push the ends of the elodea stems down into the gravel, they may stay they may not, but grow foating if it won't stay put. I can't see the hairgrass growing at all in the ceramic media but you never know. A pic of the other unidentfied plant would help. glue the java fern to some wood or rock. See how it goes with the anubias, but I wouldn't put marble or any other calcareous stone in your tank.
 
Watch YouTube videos by all means, but don’t assume they’re giving you good advice. :)
It's like anything else on the internet. Presentation masquerades as credibility. There's a lot of bad advice online but it looks ok because it's presented well.
It's a little frustrating for newcomers. You can't trust fish store employees. The internet is full of fake fish news. The only thing you can do is try to find credible sources like Seriously Fish and learn as much as you can so that you can sort out good info from bad.
 
get some liquid fertiliser like tnc lite

Take the weight off the elodea and try and push the ends of the elodea stems down into the gravel, they may stay they may not, but grow foating if it won't stay put. I can't see the hairgrass growing at all in the ceramic media but you never know. A pic of the other unidentfied plant would help. glue the java fern to some wood or rock. See how it goes with the anubias, but I wouldn't put marble or any other calcareous stone in your tank.
they literally sell the marble with the biorb. 🤦🏼‍♀️
see pics
1 to show unknown grass
2 to show full tank (i know it’s tiny)
 

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get some liquid fertiliser like tnc lite

Take the weight off the elodea and try and push the ends of the elodea stems down into the gravel, they may stay they may not, but grow foating if it won't stay put. I can't see the hairgrass growing at all in the ceramic media but you never know. A pic of the other unidentfied plant would help. glue the java fern to some wood or rock. See how it goes with the anubias, but I wouldn't put marble or any other calcareous stone in your tank.
tnc lite looks serious. why the 2 caps? is it easy to use? i need simple
 
marble is a form of limestone so it will raise the hardness of the water, although to what degree I do not know, but best not to have it in there imo. The unidentified plant looks like a type of vallisneria. It's a good plant to have in an aquarium but may struggle in the substrate you have and lighting might be an issue. See how it goes.
 
tnc lite looks serious. why the 2 caps? is it easy to use? i need simple
Don't worry about the fact it has two caps. the same stuff comes out of both caps, it's just for convenience of dosing. If you have a very large tank you open the main cap, for small tanks just use the cap with the small bubble underneath it. the bubble fills up when you apply a slight squeeze to the bottle. You can then measure how much you want. Get some graduated plastic pipettes like these. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Pipettes-P...86a-97e6-dfd7b9de88a8&pd_rd_i=B07NMBJPCV&th=1

They help with measuring all sorts of things for nano tanks - water conditioner, ferts etc.
 
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