Help For A Nervous Newbie

[David J]

Hi

I have just taken delivery of my first tropical aquarium, a Fluval Roma 90L. i have spent a few weeks reading up on fish and have a fair idea what stock i want but now need to gravel/sand, decoration and plants.

FYI, these are the fish I'm hoping to add.

Neon tetras, dwarf gourami, Pygmy cory, cherry shrimp, possibly honey gourami and maybe another group of small fish yet to be decided.

The tank was being delivered with bags of Dorset pea gravel. I've read that dwarf corys won't do well with this so I'm considering going for a much finer gravel or sand. I intend on having a piece of bogwood and some rocks. However, when looking into plants, I am very overwhelmed and finding it very difficult to decide.

Here are my thoughts so far:

I know I need to get a range of plants to go from the back to foreground. I know I need to create plenty of cover for the fish to make them more comfortable with places to hide. I am also reading that some floating plants will help the fish as some appreciate shaded areas.

My concerns/questions are:

I am worried that with me being a beginner with so much to learn about the fish themselves, that also having to learn about how to look after the plants will be too much. Am I worried about nothing? Will they pretty much just take care of themselves?

I am aware of the benefits live plants bring to the tanks. In light of my concern on maintenance etc, would it be a good idea to go for a mix of fake and live plants or should I choose one or the other?

As I said above, I am debating whether to go with gravel or sand. Does one have any benefit over the other when it comes to plants? Or, can I use a mixture ie mainly sand with a small area of gravel?

And here it is. The million dollar question. Based on the fish mentioned above, are there any particular plants you would recommend?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I am hoping to sart a fish less cycle ASAP but want to do it right so won't start until I am sure I am reading and informed.

Many thanks,

David

 

[thereverendturtle]

First off, just one species of gourami.
As for substrate, some plants do better in gravel, swords and crypts come to mind as they are heavy root feeders. You can keep them in sand, you just need to add root fertilizer tabs, every now and again.
Good starter plants would be; swords, crypts, java fern, mosses, anubias, vals, and some bunch plants.

 

[SombreroBanana]

For plants, I would definitely choose either live or fake. I would go with live. That's what I did, and I'm loving it. Background plants, if you want something easy (on the eyes as well), go with jungle val, anacharis, cabomba, or hairgrass. Midground, anubias (I love this stuff), java fern, crypts, or hygro. Foreground, anubias, riccia fluitans, mosses, etc. For floating plants, you can go with duckweed, amazon frogbit (this stuff is amazing), or watersprite. For general care, any of these plants listed only need water, substrate and the occasional dose of fertilizer. I dose Flourish twice weekly and my plants grow about a half inch a day.

For substrate, I would go sand. I went with Flourite, and I'm regretting it. There's so many cool fish that you can only keep if you have sand. A lot of people only go with gravel because of the risk of gas buildup. If you put in some malaysian trumpet snails, they'll dig around in the sand and there'll be no buildup. If you do a mixture, over time the gravel will just sink to the bottom and you'll never see it again.

Hope this helps.

 

[SO19Firearms]

Crack on with your cycle and have a think what you want to have. Take a look at the stickies hear to get an understading of what a planted tank needs.

As for substrate, some plants do better in gravel, swords and crypts come to mind as they are heavy root feeders. You can keep them in sand, you just need to add root fertilizer tabs, every now and again.
Good starter plants would be; swords, crypts, java fern, mosses, anubias, vals, and some bunch plants.

Not really such a thing as a heavy root feeder. An aquarium plant will take it's nutrition from anywhere. You're right about root tabs being beneficial, but that doesn't have to be because a plant is a heavy root feeder. They're opportunistic weeds
IMO

 

[thereverendturtle]

I have to disagree with you mate. Swords and crypts do much better with root feeding, than just what's available in the water. That's why I said they would do better in a fine gravel. Fish waste and uneaten food will work its way down into the substrate and feed the plants. Bunch plants on the other hand are, like you said weeds, and will grow well with what nutrients are available in the water.

 

[Ps3Steveo]

Agree with SO19 here I've kept every crypt going and substrate in high tech environments made no difference at all, aquatic plants have roots to anchor not too feed hence the change from immersed to submerged also so the plant can feed through the leaves fert wise.

 

[thereverendturtle]

If the roots are only anchors, how do they feed when emersed?

 

[SO19Firearms]

If the roots are only anchors, how do they feed when emersed?

The point is really not where they feed from but the fact they can feed from anywhere. The same way that house plants love foliar feeds - they get all the nutrients without having to mobilise them through the plant.
IMO the whole arguement becomes academic as even if i were to concede that plants like swords only feed through their roots I'd maintain that it's still wet under the substrate

Again IMO, i believe that the reason you seen better growth from swords, crypts etc when you're using nutritious substrate / substrate additives are becuase of just that - the nutrition that you're adding that may be insoluble so therefore require microbial action to release it to the root - What you'd then get is the illusion that this is beneficial to "Heavy root feeders" but of little benefit to a a cut stem with no roots.
Another point would be that if you add something like TNC Plugs, Tropica Capsules or Osmocote the Swords will cream themselves over the ammonia in them and again, this wouldn't be of much use to the stem as it won't get released directly in to the water column.

After all that I guess I'll stick with "Heavy root feeder" is a myth, but I will yield and accept the reasons why substrate modification can be seen as beneficial....it's more the plants without roots don't get the advantages tho IMO.

 

[Ps3Steveo]

Like I said that's why they change from immersed to submerged growth, when immersed yes they do but when submerged they use what's easiest, most ferts are in the water column hence using leaves, if there is no nutrients in the water but in the substrate it will leech in to the water column if soluble which most are.

 

[RadaR]

After all that I guess I'll stick with "Heavy root feeder" is a myth, but I will yield and accept the reasons why substrate modification can be seen as beneficial....it's more the plants without roots don't get the advantages tho IMO.

Does the plant have access to enough nutrients? Yep. Does it matter whether its in the substrate or water? Nope.

I could set up a tank with an inert substrate, no fish, dose the water column and grow some great swords/crypts.

 

[David J]

Hi

Thanks to everyone that replied. I've decided to definitely go with sand which I have now bought and is in the tank. I will go for live plants. Thanks for the suggestions on good ones to start with. I am current looking through them all before deciding which to get. I think I will also get some Malaysian trumpet snails but I'm a bit concerned as heard they breed like crazy and overrun the tank. I heard however that if this does happen, a few assassin snails will soon sort them out.

Does anyone have an opinion on MTS?

Regards,

David

 

[RadaR]

Snail populations only get out of control through over feeding.

 

[biohazard156]

Hi David!

Good to see another local fishkeeper! Since you have the same water as I will, I would recommend keeping soft water species of fish, and I'd avoid the dwarf gourami... The honey gourami seem to be much more hardy and much less grumpy than the dwarfs!

I have sand in two of my tanks, one is half sand/half gravel. Under the sand I have tetra complete substrate which helps the rooted plants I have.

I can sort you out with some plants when you are cycled, I have loads of java fern and lots of floatIng plants.. I'd kit out your tank with some nice bogwood or Redmond root and attach some Anubis, java fern and some mosses. These all cope well with even low light and are fairly hardy. Crypts are nice and hardy too for planting in the substrate, moss balls are good low light plants too that are easy to keep .

If you want a slightly different shoaling fish to go with your small shoal of neons, you could go for some ember tetra, a nice nano species which great contrasting colour for the neons

With regard to mts, I have them in all tanks, as they help churn up the sand so it doesn't go anaerobic. I have assassins in the big tank and they haven't gotten out of control thanks to them

 

[David J]

Hi all

Thanks for the advice. I think I've kinda settled on the following plants:

Jungle val (Vallisneria americana (gigantea)
Anubias barteri var. angustifolia
Java moss - Taxiphyllum barbieri (Vesicularia)
Frog bit

What do you reckon for the combination of plants? Should I get more different kinds on top of these? Would I need to do anything special with these plants?

Regarding the Malaysian trumpet snails, I want them but still nervous. Do you think it's ok to get MTS and Assassin Snails at the same time or will the assassins just eat all the MTS right away thus defeating the purpose?

Cheers,

David

 

[Ps3Steveo]

Your plant choice is fine, I'd be inclined to get more, maybe some Crypts and Swords, the moss and Anubias need to be glued/tied to some hardscape really.

As for special care, you'll more than likely be fine and not need much, perhaps some trace ferts.

With the snails the Assassins would make a quick start on them.

Out of curiosity, what lights do you have?