Regional tanks… even more challenging than the fish… plants

[Magnum Man]

I’ll admit I’m not doing all that well with plants, but I’m starting to figure things out… floating plants, so far seem easier… but now I’m looking at trying to start planting correct species into each regional tank… next I think will be water lettuce, into the African tank… currently I have giant duckweed in that tank… I initially put it there, to have some going over the winter, to go back outside to my tilapia raising tanks in the spring… but that is s soft water tank, I should get it acclimated to the water that it will be in next summer… so I’m moving it all to my rainbow tank, that has the same water chemistry, as the Tilapia will be in, and some African water lettuce will be taking it’s place n the African Tetra tsnk… that’s 1st stage… 2nd stage will be replacing the Java Ferns with Anubis, and possibly African water ferns… so this tank I’ve looked at… next, will be the South American, and the Asian tanks…

Anyone else try and match the plants to the fish, by region???

 

[MuddyWaters]

The new tank I'm working on will be South American fish, but I have not tried to do the same with the plants. I kind of looked at it, but honestly, I'm not sure the natural environment these fish live in will have as many plants as I'm going to have in my tank. So, this is where I the idea of what I want the tank to look like deviates from nature.

Is the difficulty finding plants you like that will work in the regional tank or keeping them alive? I have been really lucky with plants over time- I've never had too much trouble with them, except for one time when I tried a cheap CO2 method. I was not consistent in the application of the CO2 and I was not consistent in maintenance- that created a disastrous amount of black beard algae and whatever else- had to yank all the plants and hardscape and start again that time.

I'm not taking chances on the new tank, though- I've purchased a good CO2 setup and have done a lot of reading- I think I'm going to use the Estimative Index (EI) method to fertilize. Basically alternate fertilizer types with large doses 6 days a week and then 50%-75% water changes once a week (no fertilization that day). I THINK that will make it easier to keep the plants the way I want them- I'll have to trim them a lot and all that, but won't have to worry as much about them melting.

My 15 gallon has no CO2, but I do kind of overfeed, which does provide CO2. I started to get some black beard algae on my anubias plants, but started fertilizing with API root tabs and API Leaf Zone in the water column. I happened to have a bottle of it laying around that I bought a couple of years ago, so started using it. No real reason other than that.

For the new tank I'm going to make my own fertilizer using a recipe found on this site. Cheaper over time, and something else to fiddle around with.

I haven't looked at other fertilization methods, though. I saw this one and figured it would work for me, so I haven't looked further, but there are a bunch of other ways to go about it.

Anyway, the answer to your question is no, but I did think about it and above is what I decided to do instead. I did read that plants are harder to keep than the fish- I can see how that's true. I spend more time messing with them than I do with the fish by far.

 

[GaryE]

I was very surprised at how few plants I saw this summer in Gabon. There was a Vallisneria type thing, the occasional Anubias out in the streams, and a thing like Riccia. I didn't see any of my beloved Bolbitis in the water.

I have a one track mind in a stream - fish first. I am no expert on plants. But if I had been after underwater plants, the pickings would have been lean.

If you want a look at South American plants, look for Oliver Lucanus' books - the Amazon Below Water and his Xingu book. You can also check the Below Water website or youtube channel. Ivan Mikolji is another brilliant source of quality wild videos.

 

[MuddyWaters]

My local aquarium club had a guy (Jeff Cardwell) come show us pics & video from his trip to Colombia recently. It's a small sample size, but the video he showed didn't show a ton of plants around the fish. Way more water between plants in the space he showed on his videos than I'll have in my tank. I guess it would be harder to get in there and get the fish in the midst of a bunch of plants, though.

I like the idea of having regional fish together, but I want a beautiful pile of plants to go with them, LOL. I'll check out Oliver Lucanus- thanks for the tip!

 

[Magnum Man]

I cut up 2 more plant dams for the rainbow tank ( more alkaline water ) like the Tilapia tanks have in them, and moved a net full of the giant duckweed from the African tank, to that tank… it grew good outside, so hopefully I’ll get a bunch growing in the new tank… for next summer… will finish transferring it to the other tank just before the African water lettuce gets here… I think the African Tetras like the surface cover, so I’ll leave some duckweed in that tank as long as possible… BTW… I like the giant duckweed better that the common Lemna Minor… much easier to control, reproduces almost as fast, and the Tilapia love eating it

 

[GaryE]

The Phenacos and Alestopetersius won't like surface plants. They want moving water at the surface, and that pushes surface plants away. They wouldn't be caught dead in a planted neighbourhood.

 

[Magnum Man]

I only cover half the tank, so the water’s surface flows pretty good, until it hits the plant dam, that holds the floaters on the other side