Plants?

[Nick Bramley]

ive been wondering about not having plants in my tank as it would make it considerably easier to clean, i dont have true aquarium plants anyway so i dont think they contribute much to my water as far as food for my fish and adding oxygen so i dont see why as long as i have plenty of cover for my fish that it should be a problem. i have a large rock, a large cave and several small shells that my cories and shrimp like and il also get another ornament for them to hide in/behind.

any suggestion or opinions would be useful, thanks

Nick

 

[loachman]

ive been wondering about not having plants in my tank as it would make it considerably easier to clean, i dont have true aquarium plants anyway so i dont think they contribute much to my water as far as food for my fish and adding oxygen so i dont see why as long as i have plenty of cover for my fish that it should be a problem. i have a large rock, a large cave and several small shells that my cories and shrimp like and il also get another ornament for them to hide in/behind.

any suggestion or opinions would be useful, thanks

Nick

as long as you have well filtered water, do water changes, have some cover, and don't have O2 shortages it doesn't matter to most fish. All of them can easily be accomplished w/o plants.

 

[Nick Bramley]

two filters, wet and dry trickle and an aquaone internal filter, do 20% water change every week and hoover the gravel, the venturi on the internal filter gives out quite alot of bubbles which break up the surface and i will definately make sure theres plenty of cover.

Thank you

Nick

 

[Bignose]

Need is too strong of a word, espeically since the ones you are using are fake, they aren't contributing anything. That said, I like my tanks to try to replicate a little slice of nature in my home, and nature definately has plants. I have a combonation of silk plants (fakes) and real plants. It is tough to know what the fish think, espeically since most of the fish in the LFS are tank-raised and have never seen a real plant in their life, but they might prefer a more natural setting too. It really depends on what kind of fish you are keeping. Cory catfish developed in the rivers of the Amazon basin, lots of vegetation there. On the flip side, the Rift lake cichlids are very rocky and have almost no plants whatsoever. But, again, need is too strong of a word -- it is your tank, you can do with it as you please.

 

[Nick Bramley]

i dont have fake plants its just the ones i have arent true aquarium ones, i get them because they look pretty good and they seem to last longer than aquarium ones, will never go for fake plants but might just have a large grassy plant in the corner as it will be quite easy to clean around.

Nick

 

[vinylman]

If you go for hardy, genuine aquatic plants, they'll benefit the water as well as the fish.

 

[Nick Bramley]

after a little thinking and a visit to the Betta forum ive decided to get some floating plants as these wont get in the way of my cleaning and will benfit my little female Betta.

Thank you for the advice

Nick