Adding live plants to 55 gal aquarium

[Crustyshellback]

I recently completed the initial cycle on my 55 gal high profile (48" wide, 23" tall, 12" deep aquarium. I've got 6 juvenile Angels, 6 juvenile Dennisons and a Pleco. There are quite a few silk plants for cover, and I added 2 small live plants about a month ago. I don't remember what they're called, but they have broad leaves and the guy at the LFS said the Pleco won't bother them. I'm running 2 over the side filters. one 75 gal and one 40 to 60 gal. I was told that the Dennisons require very clean water. I've read that a tank that is heavily planted requires less maintenance. I don't mind the maintenance, but I figure the least invasive maintenance schedule would probably be the best. My concern is that the low bioload in my tank won't support a heavily planted environment. Also, do I have too much filtration to support a planted tank? If not, what kinds and how many plants would be right for my tank?

 

[fish wrangler]

Welcome to the forum!

As far as adding plants it depends on your lights. If your lights are decent you can grow different low light plants like crypts, amazon sword, java fern, and/or anubias.

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[Hooked on Fish]

Hi Crusty,

I agree with Fish Wrangler, you need to have adequate lighting ie the right intensity, spectrum and length of exposure. To save energy and reduce heat I've installed a PlantGlo 120 LED lighting system.

With the deeper tank it's definitely better to use plants that have lower light requirements. Instead of carpeting plants I've used a variety of Crypts to fill in the front of the tank with Swords in the middle ground and bunch plants in the background. I've also added a few Anubias attached to driftwood that I've positioned on rocks to raise their height in the tank. Having them attached to driftwood also makes it possible to remove them from the tank for cleaning.

Other things to consider are plant nutrient and CO2. You need to keep light, nutrient and CO2 in balance if you want to have healthy plants.
There are two basic approaches to maintaining a planted aquarium often classified as high or low tech.

To get the fastest plant growth the high tech approach is best but will cost you more and requires careful management. High tech uses CO2 injection, fertilizer dosing and high levels of lighting. Personal I prefer a more low tech approach using a soil substrate, a daily dose of a Glutaraldehyde product similar to Flourish Excel (to help control algae and accelerate plant growth) and a lower light exposure. You can always dose the tank with fertilizers if you have a nutrient deficiency but usually in a low tech setup the limiting factor is CO2.

On the matter of filtration the HOBs sound fine. A heavily planted tank will also help with the filtering.

Hope your new tank goes well.

 

[ScotJudd]

Hi. If you have your tank set up as you like it then try a couple of different plants and see how they go. I have found that crypts, Java moss and fern all do well in my tank, soft flesh plants do not. I have medium lighting, medium Co2 and Flourish. I use Excel (Glut) daily as well and suspect this is what melted some of the plants. To some extent its trial and error unless you have specifically set up your tank for plants.


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