Help Please I Have No Clue About Plants!

[Fate2006]

Hey... okay here's the situation... I'm getting a 5 gallon hex tank on Friday for a dwarf puffer and I want to heavily plant the tank, but I have never had any experience with plants before... I've heard that hornwort and java fern are good to start with as they need little CO2 and lighting wise. But I need to know that will the plants speed up my cycle? (shouldn't take but 2-5 days, mature water and filter) any help would be great

 

[rockerBOO]

I have had good experience with water wisteria. Seems to grow well. Java fern seems to grow slow for me. But it does well in most cases. Hornwort is pretty good, I personally do not like it's fine leaves. Plus when it looses it's leaves, it can leave a mess.

 

[Fate2006]

Okay thx this answers one of my questions... SO I'll try java fern and water wisteria... my next question now is how do plants effect cycling? will it slow it down or speed it up? Because I've been told they use the ammonia and nitrates as fertalizer... also thats another question! How do I fertalize my plants?

 

[rockerBOO]

So if you follow the nitrogen path.

Ammonia, Nitrites, Nitrates.

So they take in lower amounts of ammonia, and nitrites, but higher in nitrates. So in turn of it slowing your cycle down, it could be possible, but I am not sure how much.

Fertalizer could come in dry/liquid. Read the pinned topics for information about that. Reading the pinned topics should help with a lot of these questions .