Starting Out Again!

[Tuppers]

Hi guys just starting out keeping fish again after my fire nearly two years ago!

Just got a small 60l tank and in the middle of getting it sorted to start a fishless cycle. I am wanting to get some plants in there and was wondering how many would anyone recomend? I am thinking 5 may be a little too much?? Also I have been given a tub of plant fertilizer made by tetra would you recommend using it or steer clear?

Thaks in advance for any help any suggestions!

Tuppers

 

[Mr Bliss]

What kind of fertilizer is it? Tetra PlantaMin? That's a product that commonly comes with new tank packages anyway; it's a trace nutrient mix that may or may not be useful to your plants during cycling (depending on your tap water and the amount of plants and light), but at any rate it won't do any harm if you follow the recommended dosage.

You can't really have too many plants as long as the fish have room to swim (and the plants aren't shading each other too much). You could go with plenty of small plants (or plants with small leaves at any rate) as they'll make the tank look bigger. Or just pick one or a couple of bigger plant species as a "centerpiece"; personally I love piles of rock or bogwood with plenty of Anubias and/or java fern growing on them. Or make it a total jungle. Some plants will grow almost anywhere, others are more demanding about lights, nutrients and temperature. This thread, in combination with google image search, might be useful for selecting the plants you want in advance:

http/www.fishforums.net/content/Plants-a...-Planted-links/

 

[Tuppers]

What kind of fertilizer is it? Tetra PlantaMin? That's a product that commonly comes with new tank packages anyway; it's a trace nutrient mix that may or may not be useful to your plants during cycling (depending on your tap water and the amount of plants and light), but at any rate it won't do any harm if you follow the recommended dosage.

You can't really have too many plants as long as the fish have room to swim (and the plants aren't shading each other too much). You could go with plenty of small plants (or plants with small leaves at any rate) as they'll make the tank look bigger. Or just pick one or a couple of bigger plant species as a "centerpiece"; personally I love piles of rock or bogwood with plenty of Anubias and/or java fern growing on them. Or make it a total jungle. Some plants will grow almost anywhere, others are more demanding about lights, nutrients and temperature. This thread, in combination with google image search, might be useful for selecting the plants you want in advance:

[URL="http/www.fishforums.net/content/Plants-a...-Planted-links/"]http/www.fishforums.net/content/Plants-a...-Planted-links/[/URL]

Thanks for that its actually a fertilizer that goes underneath the gravel??

 

[waterdrop]

Well, as I see it, there's really 3 paths you can follow with respect to plants and fishless cycling:

1) *No plants* at all: This has the advantage that the plants you pay a lot of money for don't get covered in ugly brown algae that so often becomes thick in the ammonia laden tank that is growing the bacteria. Also you don't have to worry about whether dying plants are adding still more ammonia and complicating the numbers you are seeing. Also, if you have no plants then you know that the numbers you are getting are not being changed by the plants. A big disadvantage of no plants is that the tank is empty and more ugly right when your family and friends are giving you the hardest time about having a tank with no fish! Another disadvantage (theoretically) is that it could be that plants carry in some beneficial bacteria on them and thus serve as an added "inoculant" of the good bacteria. And its a disadvantage not to begin practicing how to keep plants and thus learning more about them.

2) Having *some* plants: This gets rid of the disadvantages alluded to above, allowing you to feel you've maybe got an inoculant and that your tank is prettier and that you are learning about plants. They also might use up some of the excess nitrates (NO3) in the second phase of fishless cycling which would be good. This is my preferred setting for fishless cycling.

3) Having *LOTS* of plants: This, in my opinion puts you, sometimes unwittingly, into a different hobby, that of the "planted tank." Planted tanks (freshwater) are truly beautiful when done well. I want one, I love them. Doing a tank startup as a planted tank enthusiast with lots of plants can be one of the great ways to start a tank. But in my opinion, it can be very hard to understand a fishless cycle, in the context we talk about it here and with our rdd1952 instructions, if you have a heavily planted tank. Heavy plantings can essentially use up so much of the ammonia that you are putting in that the beneficial bacteria will take forever to form. This is not a bad thing if you are good at keeping all these plants alive and very healthy, but its important to understand that it can be quite a complicating factor for fishless cycling. This is just my opinion and some members may give my flak for this, or have a different way of describing it to beginners.

~~waterdrop~~