Need A Wing To Fly Under

[MontyJ]

I bought my youngest daughter a 29 gallon tank which is currently fishless cycling. It's nice and all, but I'm an avid gardener and love a challenge. When I saw some of the planted tanks I was hooked on the challenge. I can grow any dirt based plant that's suitable for my zone, but I have never grown aquatic plants. I need some help to get started. There is no rush to get the tank up and running right away since I don't even have a tank yet. However, like my garden, I want to go big. A 55 gallon plus is the bare minimum size I will accept. I prefer much larger, just depends on what I can find. Since I know I can get a 55 gallon, let's start with that as a base.

I know how plants work...soil based that is...so I'm not a noob to plant biology. I have read a lot of the information here on the forum as well. I'm asking for a mentor to help get me started...someone to take me under their wing, so to speak. In exchange, I will offer all of the knowledge I have about vegetable gardening. In other words, help me get started in aquatic plants and I will help you grow a 4 pound tomato...or a 1000 pound pumpkin. I'll even provide seeds free of charge.

 

[JenCliBee]

Everybody is here to help.. just simply ask questions that are needed and im sure there will be plenty of members willing to help , getting varying opinions is better than just getting one persons approach


P.S... it may be an idea to remove the link, im not entirely sure what the mods take is on linking to other non fish related forums?

 

[tribalbrit]

The basics are presurised co2 injection 3ppm, lighting at 2-3w per gallon, and dry ferts. magnisium sulphate, potasium nitrate, monopotasium phosphate, every other day, trace mix on the other days.

Well thats what I do. and have been doing for afew years now.

 

[Ps3Steveo]

To be honest it depends on what plants you want, if your going for stems, which are fast growing then ideally you want fertilizer, CO2, good substrate and plenty of time for trimming etc, oh and if things dont go so well to start with such as algae problems which can get very frustrating.

If you go down the high tech route using CO2, fertilizer and high lighting then you need good filtration and very good flow so be expecting to spend the extra cash.

If you want rhizome plants (Anubias, Crypts and Ferns) which are less demanding and slow growing then you'll be better of with the basic low lighting and the odd bit of fertilizer, much easier for the novice aquascaper.

If you want a challenge then things like HC as a carpet plant and Lmnophilia Aromatica (aquatic herb plant) are a challenge to grow well.

Have a look on sites like aquarium-gardening as they have collections on there which are good for inspiration, then you can check the tropica website where you can find those plants and check their temperature, CO2, fertilizer and lighting needs.

Also you need to check which fish you would like in your planted scape as if they are regular tetra you can have a huge variety of plants where as if they are fish that live in acidic waters you will need to re think your scape as not so many plants like acidic waters.

We're all here to help anyway, no one knows everything about aquatic plants, even the best are always learning.