Why Can't I Keep Plants?

[Better is Betta]

Hi everyone...I want to keep plants in my tank but it never works for me. They never last more than a couple of weeks in my tanks and I have to resort to artificial ones or indoor plants. I've got some advice from a person that keeps rainbows in his tank and he had beautiful ribbon weed growing everywhere, it was just beautiful. It looked like a kelp garden. He said he put down a layer of clay on the bottom of his tank first before putting in the gravel. Is this a good idea? I thought this could harbor harmful bacteria and how do you clean it. Anyone out there that had success with plants that can give me some good advice.
Bev.

 

[StandbySetting]

What's the volume of your tank, and how many watts of light are over it? Can you tell us everything that is written on the tubes?

 

[twodoctors]

I don't know about you, but I'm new to the hobby (4 months). My plants (see signature) are fine in sand and fine gravel without CO2 or plant substrates. The larger tank I have 2 pinkish light and a white light, and the smaller tank I have 2 white light. The only plant I haven't had much luck with is the Vallisneria. Apparently one is not supposed to bury anything above the root into the substrate otherwise the plant will rot and die.

Hope that helps.

Adrian

 

[Caprichoso]

Hi everyone...I want to keep plants in my tank but it never works for me. They never last more than a couple of weeks in my tanks and I have to resort to artificial ones or indoor plants. I've got some advice from a person that keeps rainbows in his tank and he had beautiful ribbon weed growing everywhere, it was just beautiful. It looked like a kelp garden. He said he put down a layer of clay on the bottom of his tank first before putting in the gravel. Is this a good idea? I thought this could harbor harmful bacteria and how do you clean it. Anyone out there that had success with plants that can give me some good advice.
Bev.

What kind of plants have you tried growing? There really should be no reason why plants won't grow for you unless you are putting the wrong plants in. (either non aquatic types or plants that require more light than you are offering).

 

[MBOU]

Lights require work, same as they would do if you went to a garden center and bought a plant.

Plants have different requirements and so some are easier to grow than others.

Vallis is a really easy one to grow with **one** problem, it prefers dirtier water, higher nitrates and phosphate. I cant put it my tank as it is uncontrollable but i let my phosphates stay right at the top of the scale (and because of it, im binning about £20 worth of plants a week in what i hack out).

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Lighting, definately have good lighting, the brightest white (JBL Nature, Hagens Light Glo and so on) and one aimed at plants. (though personally I have two JBL Nature T5s).

Substrate, i have used loads of different substrates like Aquabasis and all the powdery plant substrates that turn to mush and that you dont want to disturb once in. My solution was JBL Manado, i have used it instead of gravel (though you can cover it if you want) and I went for having nearly 2 Inches of it. It works by absorbing all the minerals etc from the water and release it through the roots of the plants. The more plant food you put in, the more the plants grow because he substrate really helps. Works best when using tapwater because there is so many nitrites and nitrates in he water.