Light CO2 and everything.

[boured]

I have had live plants in my tank for years. always had problems with growing I now have a few that grow well. but most dont. I used to use plant food. but was then told I dont need it because fish supplied fertiliser for plants. I cant say it made any difference when I used it so I stopped.I have two strip lights on for 12 hours a day, and hardly any algai, infact my one clown plec keeps on top of it, I always wanted a bit of algai or moss to grow on the rocks but this has never happened.
Now I hear about plants bubbling and using co2 infusion and gravel injecting.
So from the beguinning can someone tell me how to grow plants succesfully? ) .

 

[Lateral Line]

Plants require light to grow, that is by far the most important thing. Bright enough light for 12 hours a day. How bright depends on the plant type, 2 Watts per gallon for medium light plants, 3-4 Watts for high light plants. If you do not have enough light, no amount of CO2 or fertilisers will make any difference.

After light, the next limiting factor is CO2. Many easy to grow plants grow slowly enough that the fish and atmosphere provide enough CO2. Very fast growing, high metabolism plants, (generally those that require very high light levels), will benefit from CO2 injection as it will be the limiting factor. If there is not enough CO2, no amount of fertilisers will help.

Liquid fertilisers are rarely necesssary, the livestock and filter products provide sufficient. In low stocked aquaria, it may help from time to time. Many rooted plants take nutrients from the substrate, so fertiliser pellets in the sand etc. are also useful.

Summary, Light, then CO2, then fertilisers.

Browse Tropicas plant list to find plants which match your water/light parameters, and go for plants labelled "Easy" or "Very Easy" if you don't want to worry about CO2.

 

[Bol]

Here's my suggestion (although I'm a semi-newbie at plants, had them for about six months):

Decide on one thing first -- do you want to a) pick the plants you want, and then adjust your lighting, or do you want to B) stick with your current lighting, and pick your plants based on that?

Option B is a lot simpler, and still allows you to have plants that grow well, provided you pick the right ones.

And, to answer your title question, the reason CO2 is injected is, in higher-light scenarios, the plants will use all the CO2 available in the water, so that becomes a limiting factor to growth. CO2 is then injected to allow the plants to grow better/faster.

However, from what I've gathered, injecting CO2 does little, if any, good at lower light levels (below 2 watts per gallon).

Plantgeek.net is another excellent source of information, both in the plant guide and their forums.

 

[boured]

thanks everyone just checked out http/www.tropica.com/default.asp
Got a list of VERY EASY GROW plants going to try shop for them.