Unexpected Birthday Present - New Plants

Vivienne

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After my disastrous first attempt with plants recently, I had intended to wait until fishless cycling had finished before trying again. However, the family have given me some fishy stuff (including new plants) for my birthday. Many of the plants have high light requirements, so I'm gonna go to the lfs to get stuff to upgrade the standard Juwel tube that's on the tank today. (Present to myself!)

When I put plants in last time I took them out of their pots and removed every bit of the fibrous growing media around the roots. I also cut off any roots that looked like they were rotting. Was this the right thing to do ? Or should I just take them out of the pots and plant them (fibrous media and all) straight in the gravel ? Bare rooted, it was hard to get them to stay in the gravel.

Also, how do I stop the ones that have come as bundles of cuttings from floating straight up out of the gravel ? Substrate is a mix of laterite and fine gravel. No CO2 injection. Hoping that won't be necessary since the tank won't be that heavily planted and I'd like to get to grips with upgrading the light first.

Help would be really appreciated because I don't want to kill a second batch of plants as fast as the last lot. :no:
 
Hi Vivienne

Basically yes it was the correct thing to do, remove the plants from the pots and remove as much of the wool type media as you can, you dont have to get rid of every single strand as some of them can be difficult, but as much as you can within reason.

As regards planting well you just have to be inventive and persistant to make the plants stay down, maybe your gravel isnt deep enough, 2 inches should be good enough, use anything thats available in the tank, put the gravel in heaps around the roots to make them stay, and try as best you can to plant the bunches as individual strands rather than heap them all together, but having said that i have planted bunches together and it has worked out ok, but its definatly better to try and plant them individually, like i say just be persistant and patient.

Also a good idea is to plant when you are doing a water change, as your tank will be half empty and this makes it a lot easier.

Good luck with it im sure you will manage somehow.
 
Depending on the type of plant, leaving cuttings or sprigs to float for several days or weeks allows roots to sproot. Making it easier to plant!

What kind of plants are they do you know?

ALso, try using rocks to wedge them in lightly!
 
Tweezers are a great tool for planting individual stems deep into the substrate. Plant each stem approx 1 inch apart. Cutting approx. half of the roots is a good idea to promote new growth - make sure to use sharp scissors.

If your plant grows from a rhizome i.e. Amazon Sword or Crypt then cut off half the root structure and bury deep into the substrate.

Personally I would always remove the pot and wool, this allows better root growth. Your substrate sounds ideal (I used to have great success with the same) and the roots should form quickly and anchor the plants.

What Juwel tank do you have? What are you upgrading your lighting to, are you replacing the current tube(s) or supplementing with additional tube(s)? Do you use reflectors?
 
Thanks for your help guys. Got a busy afternoon ahead !

Zig - I will do a partial water change at the same time I plant. Not only will it make life easier, I think that the high ph in the tank may be one reason that the plants weren't happy before. Current water stats are Ammonia (2.4), Nitrite (0.3), Nitrate (5) and Ph 9.5. We're just over a week into the fishless cycle and so far I've only topped up the ammonia in the tank once. I'll need to top it up again after I do the partial water change - I was thinking of about 50%. The tank temperature has settled down now to about 24/25C.

Mr Miagi - The plants I was given I think are Egeria Densa (dark green quite thick fronds that seem to be copied in the plastic plant selection a lot), Hygrophila Difformis (pale green, highly divided feathery leaves), twisted vallis and very feathery, fine purple cuttings that I haven't identified.

Today I also bought (when I went to get lighting upgrade stuff), what looks like a small Anubias, attached to a piece of bogwood, a Microsorium pteropus and a couple of cryptocoryne beckettii.

gf - The lighting is going to be interesting later today because there isn't much space to play with in the lids of the Juwel tanks. (It's a Juwel Rekord 120 tank (roughly 101 x 46 x 31cm) I'm going to get the plants in and then get the drill out on the hood.

I bought 3 tubes, 2 starter units and 1 reflector today. The original Juwel tube I plan to replace with an interpet 30W, 36" daylight bulb. There's already a reflector in place there. To it I plan to clip an interpet 30W, 36" Blue moon tube. (I really fancy being able to see what's happening in the tank late in the evening). Then I'm gonna get the drill out and attach the final tube (an arcadia 30W, 36" tropical with new reflector) to the very front of the hood. There was a great thread recently someone posted about how they did that. I'm hoping that that will just give me enough space to feed fish etc. Anything else I'll need to take the hood off, but that's OK. Don't think I've gone over the top have I ?

I haven't really done a lot of reading up about planted tanks yet - I have been concentrating on other aspects, like the cycling. I guess the next thing I need to find out about is CO2 - whether or not I need it and if so looking into the options (bearing in mind that I've already spent too much and don't even have any fish yet !!)

All advice very gratefully received !!
 
As for upgrading your lighting, you would be better served to go with power compacs. They are more expensive but you can get much higher wattages. Most of the tubes are very poor for growing plants. Also, if you can wait a few days for delivery, you can get them online at about 50% of what you will pay at the LFS or LPS. I have found hellolights.com to have the best light prices online. Petsolutins.com and bigalsonline.com are pretty good too.

Edit: By the way :bday:
 
Pity you didn't go one tank better with the Rio 125 - that's what I have. Much easier to add lighting, I have 6 tubes.

You must bear in mind that adding more lighting to a level of over 2 Watts per Gallon and you will need CO2 addition to prevent an algae infestation.

Be aware that the Blue Moon tube you plan will promote algae so ensure it's photoperiod is limited to night viewing only. Personally I would use another daylight type tube instead and go DIY CO2.

Read this thread through for more info. My lighting article will help too - it's pinned at the top of this forum. http://www.fishforums.net/index.php?showtopic=99378
 
Thanks gf - I'll spend a bit of time over the weekend reading up. I really, really like the idea of the blue tube to extend the viewing period into the evening a little, but I guess I can put it on a timer too and only switch it on for a couple of hours later in the evening. From what you're saying I guess it would be best to leave it off completely during the day too and just rely on the daylight tubes then. A bigger tank would be great - maybe Christmas time !

rdd - Thanks for the birthday wishes. I've had a great day - off work, and messing about with the tank. I'm afraid I bought the tubes already. (Impatient, plus had plants sitting in a plastic tub and a day off work today.) I think I looked at the power compacts, but the shape of them wasn't really suitable for retro fitting in the Rekord hood - there's virtually no spare space to play with.

I fitted everything in this afternoon and it looks really great (hopefully the plants will appreciate it too). Got all the plants in too and so far everything still seems healthy looking. (I know it's only been a couple of hours but I'm paranoid !) The tank is so much brighter. I'll post some pics soon.

A couple more questions.

1) Two plants (cryptocoryne) came in soil bundles wrapped up in a very fine mesh with lots of roots growing through. It would be impossible to remove the mesh and soil without really damaging the roots. These I left alone and have just completely covered the whole lot with substrate. Was this right or should I get rid of the soil bundles?

2) How quickly should I think about adding CO2 ? Do I have hours/days or weeks before the plants start to suffer ?

Thank you :D
 
Answer to question 1........i dont know

Question 2............id say you only have minutes...............only joking :D

You have 2 watts per gallon right now, i think gf was was saying that if you add more than this you will have to use co2.
 
1. Leave the "bundles". I've never heard of aquarium plants coming with soil - interesting. The soil will be providing valuable nutrients to the roots until the plants becomes established and the roots grow enough to extract nutrients from your substrate. Bear in mind that Crypts are root-feeders - do you have a nutrient-rich substrate?

2. If you have 2 WPG or less then CO2 isn't absolutely necessary although it will definitely help. Ensure you plant heavily with fast-growers to nip any potential algae problem in the bud, this combined with CO2 will provide a good defence against algae that is very common in new set-ups.
 
gf225 said:
Tweezers are a great tool for planting individual stems deep into the substrate. Plant each stem approx 1 inch apart. Cutting approx. half of the roots is a good idea to promote new growth - make sure to use sharp scissors.

If your plant grows from a rhizome i.e. Amazon Sword or Crypt then cut off half the root structure and bury deep into the substrate.
Would seperating a bunched stem plant into 5-7 individual stems and burying the group together be as suitable as planting them individually 1" apart? Is there a reason for this? I ask becuase of the simple aesthetic appeal of a stem plant when plantlets are in tight groups.

For all rhizome plants, can you bury the rhizome or are you only supposed to bury just the roots? With anubias nana, is it generally accepted that you tie it to driftwood or rocks or can you plant it in the substrate?
 
A rhizome is considered a stem that grows horizontal with verticle leaves growing from it. In most cases if you bury it it becomes cut off from oxygen and rots. Some plants that have rhizomes may grow deep complex root systems that grow verticle from the rhizome and draw nurrients from the substrate, such as Cryptpcorynes, Nymphaea, and Anubias to some extent, however other plants such as Java ferns and Bolbitis ferns grow roots that serve as anchors only and draw no nutrients.

All rhizomes may be divided to propogate the plant. You should cut the rhizome cleanly next to a leaf, but in many cases even small fragments of rhizomes can produce new leaf growth.

Anubias can be planted either in the substrate or above it attached to an object, but you should avoid burying the rhizome. If the rhizome feels squishey, then it is rotting. If you catch it in time, you can cut off the rotted portion and rescue the rest of it, but only if you improve the conditions that caused it to rot in the first place. Lack of light will also cause the rhizome to melt, but the leaves would probably fall off first.
 

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