Maintaining a cycled tank with plants

ellejay

Fish Crazy
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It is day 36 and my tank is finally cycled, hooray! First time cycling and no major dramas so I'm quite pleased with myself.

I will be stocking my tank with sparkling gouramis, pygmy corys and cherry shrimp (following advice on another thread re tank size/water parameters etc). However, I can't stock my tank until a week on Wednesday, as I'll be ordering my fish online and that's the next possible day I can be in to receive them. I know normally I'd need to add 1/3 of the ammonia dose as a snack for the bacteria every 3 days to maintain the cycle, but I'd like to have plants in and ready for the fish coming, and was wondering how this would affect things. Would I still need to add the snack/maintenance doses of ammonia? Would I need to add bigger doses to counteract what the plants will absorb? Am I just overthinking this?? :fun:

Plants - still deciding but likely water sprite, java moss (wrapped around wood), moss balls, anubias, and other easy types. Open to adding ferts but my lights are just LED strips so I'm unlikely to go high maintenance.

:thanks:
 
Would I still need to add the snack/maintenance doses of ammonia? Would I need to add bigger doses to counteract what the plants will absorb?

No to both questions. Once you have live plants, I do not recommend adding any artificial ammonia. You might want to use a comprehensive liquid plant fertilizer though. Seachem's Flourish Comprehensive Supplement for the Planted Aquarium is what I use. Just a small bottle, you use very little; as the name implies, this is a supplement to naturally-occurring nutrients from water changes and fish excrement decomposing in the substrate.

It is possible to kill plants with ammonia, so to avoid the risk, don't add it.

As for the plants/bacteria using ammonia...yes, plants will take it up faster than the bacteria so you would only be risking things for nothing. If you can get the plants established, especially the floating, you will have no issues adding fish.
 
Thanks Byron. Seachem Flourish is a name I've been hearing a lot, both on here and Reddit (highly recommend the Planted Tanks sub, there are some amazing tanks on there) so I'll look into that.
 
Thanks Byron. Seachem Flourish is a name I've been hearing a lot, both on here and Reddit (highly recommend the Planted Tanks sub, there are some amazing tanks on there) so I'll look into that.

Make sure you get the correct "Flourish" product that I named in full. Seachem make several different preparations under the "Flourish" vanner and most of them you do not need and some can cause serious issues.
 
Make sure you get the correct "Flourish" product that I named in full. Seachem make several different preparations under the "Flourish" vanner and most of them you do not need and some can cause serious issues.

Ah ok, I didn't know that, thanks!
 

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