My First Real Plant

[mitch70]

I have never had any real plants in my tank

 , I have always had silk plants and to be honest most of them are convincing, during a visit to my LFS today (originally to get a couple more nerite snails) I took the plunge!
 
 
They had some bog wood with Java Fern already attached to it, and had also attached a suction cup to the wood for this to be attached to the glass. I thought they looked really neat but having no plant experience I was unsure if it would take much looking after.
 
The very nice lady told me it was the easiest plant to look after and very hard to get wrong. That it would probably flourish without much needed from me, but if it started to look poorly to add liquid fertiliser.
 
Is she right? should I just leave it and see how it goes?
 
Also my aquarium has been running for just over a year now (Fluval 240l), it has 2x t8 lights, will these need replaced now to aid the plant?, they still seem as bright as when I first got them.
 
Thankyou.

 

[DrRob]

You have one of the easiest plants there, and they can be quite spectacular as well.
 
Generally grows slowly in low tech tanks and not massively demanding. It may get away without any changes at all from you, but a micro fertiliser would probably be appreciated, but for one small plant in a stocked 240 may not be necessary.
 
So yes, keep it simple, stay as you are and watch it grow.

 

[mitch70]

Thanks for the speedy reply DrRob, I will see how it goes for a few weeks and take it from there, are there any fertilisers you would recommend or ones to avoid?