Which fertilizer and how to add

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Vikasr

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I have a 75L (20g) tank that has 6 glofish tetra, 1 thick lipped gourami and am now putting two nerite snails. This tank has gravel substrate and plastic plants.

Now I want to remove the plastic plants and add live plants. Planning to add rooted plants like Amazon sword, Vallisneria, Bacopa caroliniana, maybe Anubias or Ambulia. Also maybe some floating ones like Hornwort, Cabomba, Anacharis, etc. Will see which ones are available then finalize.

I dont have CO2. Will need to use root tabs for some plants and liquid fertilizer for most.

Can somebody guide me which fertilizer would be suitable and how to add it?
 
Cabomba and Ambulia look similar but Ambulia is a lot easier to grow. Cabomba will either grow in a tank or die. Cabomba should also be planted in the substrate like Ambulia.

Anubius don't use a lot of nutrients or light and don't really belong in an aquarium.

If you get hornwort, make sure it has been in a tropical tank for a couple of months before adding it to your aquarium. If it goes from a cool environment to a warm environment suddenly, it dies. It is regularly grown in ponds and can have hydra, snails and leeches on it so should be quarantined for a few weeks and maybe treated with something to kill these parasites off.

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How much light is on the aquarium and how long is it on for each day?

I used a liquid iron based aquarium plant fertiliser called Sera Florena. I used a Sera iron (Fe) test to monitor the iron levels and keep them at 1mg/l (1ppm). I did a huge water change and re-dosed the tank when the level was 0ppm. Initially when I first started using the fertiliser, I had to add it every day for a few weeks. This was because the plants were using the nutrients to repair themselves after being cut and sold at a shop, then planted in my tank. Over time I added it less often until the plants started growing profusely, then I had to add it more frequently again. More plants and bigger plants will use up the fertiliser faster so you will need to add it more often. But if you use an iron based fertiliser and monitor the iron level, that will give you a rough idea of how often you need to add fertiliser.

You can also grow plants in pots that have fertiliser in them. See following post for more info.
 
AQUARIUM PLANTS 1.01

TURNING LIGHTS ON AND OFF

Stress from tank lights coming on when the room is dark can be an issue. Fish don't have eyelids and don't tolerate going from complete dark to bright light (or vice versa) instantly.

In the morning open the curtains or turn the room light on at least 30 minutes (or more) before turning the tank light on. This will reduce the stress on the fish and they won't go from a dark tank to a bright tank instantly.

At night turn the room light on and then turn the tank light off. Wait at least 30 minutes (or more) before turning the room light out. This allows the fish to settle down for the night instead of going from a brightly lit tank to complete darkness instantly.

Try to have the lights on at the same time each day. Use a timer if possible.

If you don't have live plants in the tank, you only need the light on for a few hours in the evening. You might turn them on at 4 or 5pm and off at 9pm.

If you do have live plants in the tank, you can have the lights on for 8-16 hours a day but the fish and plants need 8 hours of darkness to rest. Most people with live plants in their aquarium will have the lights on for 8-12 hours a day.


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LIGHTING TIMES
Most aquarium plants like a bit of light and if you only have the light on for a couple of hours a day, they struggle. If the light doesn't have a high enough wattage they also struggle. Try having the tank lights on for 10-12 hours a day.

If you get lots of green algae then reduce the light by an hour a day and monitor the algae over the next 2 weeks.
If you don't get any green algae on the glass then increase the lighting period by an hour and monitor it.
If you get a small amount of algae then the lighting time is about right.

Some plants will close their leaves up when they have had sufficient light. Ambulia, Hygrophilas and a few others close their top set of leaves first, then the next set and so on down the stem. When you see this happening, wait an hour after the leaves have closed up against the stem and then turn lights off.

Plant lights should have equal amount of red and blue light and a bit less green light.


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TWO LIGHT UNITS
If you have two light units on the tank, put them on timers and have one come on first, then an hour later the second one can come on. It will be less stressful for the fish.

In the evening, turn the first light off and wait an hour, then have the second light go out.

If the lights have a low, medium and high intensity setting, have them on low in the morning, then increase it to medium after a couple of hours, and then high for the main part of the day. In the evening, reverse this and have the medium setting for a few hours, then low. Then turn the lights off.


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LIST OF PLANTS TO TRY
Some good plants to try include Ambulia, Hygrophila polysperma, H. ruba/ rubra, Elodia (during summer, but don't buy it in winter because it falls apart), Hydrilla, common Amazon sword plant, narrow or twisted/ spiral Vallis, Water Sprite (Ceratopteris thalictroides/ cornuta).

The Water Sprite normally floats on the surface but can also be planted in the substrate. The other plants should be planted in the gravel.

Ambulia, H. polysperma, Elodia/ Hydrilla and Vallis are tall plants that do well along the back. Rotala macranda is a medium/ tallish red plant that usually does well.

H. ruba/ rubra is a medium height plant that looks good on the sides of the tank.

Cryptocorynes are small/ medium plants that are taller than pygmy chain swords but shorter than H. rubra. They also come in a range of colours, mostly different shades of green, brown or purplish red. Crypts are not the easiest plant to grow but can do well if they are healthy to begin with and are not disturbed after planting in the tank.

Most Amazon sword plants can get pretty big and are usually kept in the middle of the tank as a show piece. There is an Ozelot sword plant that has brown spots on green leaves, and a red ruffle sword plant (name may vary depending on where you live) with deep red leaves.

There is a pygmy chain sword plant that is small and does well in the front of the tank.


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GROWING PLANTS IN POTS
We use to grow some plants (usually swords, crypts, Aponogetons and water lilies) in 1 or 2 litre plastic icecream containers. You put an inch of gravel in the bottom of the container, then spread a thin layer of granulated garden fertiliser over the gravel. Put a 1/4inch (6mm) thick layer of red/ orange clay over the fertiliser. Dry the clay first and crush it into a powder. Then cover that with more gravel.

You put the plants in the gravel and as they grow, their roots hit the clay and fertiliser and they take off and go nuts. The clay stops the fertiliser leaching into the water.

You can smear silicon on the outside of the buckets and stick gravel or sand to them so it is less conspicuous. Or you can let algae grow on them and the containers turn green.

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We did plants in pots for a couple of reasons.
1) I was working in an aquaculture facility and we grew and sold live plants to shops. Some of the shops wanted advanced plants in pots so we did that.

2) Plants like sword plants love nutrients and have big root systems so they needed more gravel and big pots. When given ideal conditions these plants would produce lots of runners with new plants on and we got more plants to sell.

3) Most of the tanks only had a thin layer of substrate that was nowhere near thick enough for plants to grow in so having them in pots allowed us to grow plants in tanks with minimal gravel in the tank.


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TRUE AQUATIC VS MARSH/ TERRESTRIAL PLANTS
Lots of plants are sold as aquarium plants and most are marsh plants that do really well when their roots are in water and the rest of the plant is above water. Some marsh plants will do well underwater too.

Hair grass is not a true aquatic plant, neither is Anubias.

Some common marsh plants include Amazon sword plants, Cryptocorynes, Hygrophila sp, Rotala sp, Ludwigia sp, Bacopa sp. These plant do reasonably well underwater.

True aquatic plants include Ambulia, Cabomba, Hornwort, Elodia, Hydrilla and Vallis.

The main difference between marsh plants and true aquatic plants is the stem. True aquatics have a soft flexible stem with air bubbles in it. These bubbles help the plant float and remain buoyant in the water column.

Marsh plants have a rigid stem and these plants can remain standing upright when removed from water. Whereas true aquatic plants will fall over/ collapse when removed from water.


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IRON BASED PLANT FERTILISER
If you add an iron based aquarium plant fertiliser, it will help most aquarium plants do well. The liquid iron based aquarium plant fertilisers tend to be better than the tablet forms, although you can push the tablets under the roots of plants and that works well.

You use an iron (Fe) test kit to monitor iron levels and keep them at 1mg/l (1ppm).

I used Sera Florena liquid plant fertiliser but there are other brands too.


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CARBON DIOXIDE (CO2)
There is no point adding carbon dioxide (CO2) until you have the lights and nutrients worked out. Even then you don't need CO2 unless the tank is full of plants and only has a few small fish in.

There is plenty of CO2 in the average aquarium and it is produced by the fish and filter bacteria all day, every day. The plants also release CO2 at night when it is dark. And more CO2 gets into the tank from the atmosphere.

Don't use liquid CO2 supplements because they are made from toxic substances that harm fish, shrimp and snails.


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PLANT SUBSTRATE
Some pet shops sell aquatic plant substrates that are meant to improve plant growth. Most don't do anything except add a lot of ammonia to the water and eventually turn into a brown mud on the bottom. Since the majority of aquatic plants take in the nutrients they need via their leaves, having a plant substrate is not going to help much. There are exceptions to this and laterite (red clay) can sometimes be added to the gravel to increase the iron level for the plants taking in nutrients via their roots. But for most plant tanks, all you need is gravel on the bottom of the tank.

Most aquatic plants need at least 2 inches of substrate to grow in and some need 3-4 inches.
 
Thanks for the detailed guide!
We dont get Sera here but the fish shop recommends one by Aqua Trition and Seachem Flourish. I am going for Aqua Trition as it does not have N and P and it has K and other micro nutrients including Iron. They have good response for simple aquarium setups.

As you have mentioned, I will test for Fe and keep it at 1ppm - dose the fertilizer accordingly.

The shop really recommends to use liquid carbon but as suggested by you in the above post, I will skip it and see.

Is there any time at which the fertilizer should be dosed? And any time at which I should test for Fe? Like mornings or evenings?
 
Light is the prime driver with plant nutrients. The light has to be sufficient in intensity (and the correct spectrum) in order to drive photosynthesis, and different plants have different requirements here. Growth rate is a good guide; fast growers need more (brighter) light than slow growers. And with that come the fertilizer.

I would never waste my time measuring iron. If you use a quality fertilizer like the tropica @TwoTankAmin suggests, or one of the similar products (see below) there will be more than sufficient iron. Plant nutrients have to be balanced. Too much iron can cause plants to shut down assimilation of other nutrients, and some plants will melt. I had this occur twice due to my adding iron in addition to a comprehensive supplement because I over dosed the iron. It is after all a micronutrient.

Other good products are Seachem's Flourish Comprehensive Supplement for the Planted Aquarium and Brightwell Aquatics' FlorinMulti. There is TNC Lite but it is only available in the UK so far as I know. You do not need CO2 diffusion or any other form with these products.
 
This one looks good. They have two types, one for more fish with slow plants and another for less fish with fast plants. Which should I use? I have 75L tank, water maybe 60L, with 6 glofish tetras, 1 thick lipped gourami and adding 1 or 2 nerite snails. Plants will be mostly background / midground and some floating plants. Overall not a really dense setup.

I see they recommend 6ml for 50L per week. I should maybe use 8ml weekly.

I also saw the Seachem Flourish Comprehensive Supplement as mentioned by Byron above. Looks like this needs to be dosed only 5ml for 250L, i.e. 1.50ml weekly in my tank is sufficient.

So Flourish seems to be much cheaper than Tropica considering the usage. Is it true that the difference is so huge?

However, which is finally a better product for my tank - safe for fish and good for the hardy plants that I am planning to put (normal gravel substrate)?
 
I use one of these for dosing liquid fertilizer. You can get one at any drug store.

OIP.8Nfspq2VFtXjhKCa6GkeZwHaHa
 
The first bottle of plant ferts I got was Flourish. I disliked the need to refridgerate it, I think they have modified that now and teell users to do that after 3 months of the bottle being opened. I never finished that botttle because I moved to tropica. That was in 2002. Back then they had one fert. after a number of years they changed/rebranded and I stayed with it. Eventually they came out with the current system and use both. Originally I got the 5 liter jugss, They no longer offer them in the states and the cost has gone nuts.

Basically the different between the two is one has the macros and the other doesn't. There are two considerations involved in deciding which you want to use and I find in some tanks I use both.

The first consideration is in how heavily planted a tank is. As a secondary factor, how fast growing things are matters as well. The second consideration if the stocking level. Fish produce ammonia when they exhale. they make ferts when they poop and you may add some because there is uneaten food. The more fish there are in a tank, the less the need for the macros. So in my more heavily stocked and well planted tanks I do not add the macros.

In a couple of my tanks I use a mix of the two. Many plants but moderate stocking.

There are a few things they never tell us about planted tanks that are really obvious. The first we all know but often do not consider. Plants grow. This means as your plants fill in they will need more ferts. And then one day you find you have a jungle tank and your prune. So here comes the second thing. Prune heavily and the plant load is reduced considerably which also means you need to reduce the ferts.

I am not knocking Flourish. It just wasn't my choice. There are plenty of ferts on the market from which we can choose. But when I had to choose in 2002, here was my thought process. Seachem makes a tom of products, but they do not grow plants. Tropica was and probably still is the premier grower of Aquarium plants in the world. So I figured if the fertilizers they developed were good enough for them, then I would be foolish not to use what the best in the world did.

BTW- I use the cheap disposable ml doseing pitpeets. I have a 1 ml and a 3 ml. I got my first 10 for 10 cents eachand they lasted me decades. I recently bought 100 of each as they came in boxes of 100 and they basically cost me 4 cents each. AT my fish club's X-mas dinner I bagged up 5 of each size with a small candy cane and passed them out to all the members. I will be dead before I could use 200 of them myself. Curse you Amazon..........
 

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