Scheme flourish excel

[fishlover333]

I haven’t had an aquarium in around 4 years and my last one was a saltwater aquarium, I’ve not done a planted aquarium before but I am going to get a fluval spec 19 that I wanna do a nice planted tank for. I read co2 would be good for it. But I’ve done some more reading and a lot of people say that co2 dosing isn’t required for a low tech planted and could potentially do more harm and killing some plants. Should I forget about using this stuff?

 

[Essjay]

Should I forget about using this stuff?

Yes.

The active ingredient is glutaraldehyde which is used, amongst other things, to sterilise surgical equipment and in embalming fluid. It may be OK in a plant-only tank but is not a good idea in a tank with fish. There are other brands of 'liquid CO2' and most of them also use glutaraldehyde.


Depending on what type of plant you intend and if you also have fish, you may not need CO2. Slow growing, low light plants do not need added CO2 and the CO2 produced by fish and the micro-organisms in the substrate is more than enough for this type of plant. Fast growing, high light plants may be different in which case CO2 gas is preferable to liquid CO2 products.

 

[2tank]

Dont do liquid except for an iron based fertilizer. If you want to do co2 just put a plastic bottle upside down and fill from a tank it then disperses slowly for much cheaper than buying a co2 system.

 

[fishlover333]

Okay thank you that’s what I thought when I was reading up about it after word.
Yes I’m gonna try with low light and slow growing plant. I’m all new to the planted aquarium so it’s gonna be a learning curve for sure!

the substrate I’m using is gonna be the fluval plant substrate so I’m hoping that will help aid the plants growth and health.

I’m hoping the tank andstuff I’ve ordered comes this week and I can get that started. I’ve ordered 3 plants to being with; Monte Carlo, Cryptocoryne x willisii andsagittaria subulata as I’ve heard they good ones.
Any other easy to grow plant advise would be much appreciated

 

[Essjay]

This site is useful as you can search for plants by difficulty.

The right aquarium plants - Tropica Aquarium Plants

The right aquarium plants

tropica.com

 

[fishlover333]

Thank you that’s websites very helpful!

also I’m gonna be using liquid fetilizerwill that be sufficient enough as I’ve noticed on thread people talking about using root tabs

 

[Essjay]

Root tabs are mainly used for plants which are heavy root feeders - typical examples are sword plants and crypts. Other plants feed through their leaves - java fern and anubias are examples of this.

The best general liquid fertilisers are Seachem Flourish Comprehensive Supplement for the Planted Aquarium, TNC Lite (UK) and Brightwell FlorinMulti (USA).
One of the best root tabs is Seachem Flourish root tabs as they don't leach nutrients into the water. One of our members used a cheap root tab which caused a nitrite spike!

 

[fishlover333]

The fertiliser I’ve ordered is the tropica specialised nutrition, will this suffice and I’ll change over to one you mention afterwards?
That’s handy to know regarding the root tabs, I don’t think I’ll need to use them now as I’m just kinda doing the carpet plants right now and I’ll build my way throughout

 

[Essjay]

I would use the one you have then when it's gone look at the ones I've mentioned.