Fertilizer for Plants..?

[Laurie]

I'm really not sure what you use for a planted tank. I really love them and want to try my hand at one. Right now I have one live plant in my 30 gallon (water wisteria) and so far it's doing well but I know that need food as well as the fish and I have no clue what or how to do that. I see references of co2 but I'm truly clueless. Any help or advise would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

 

[Bettafanatic]

What lighting do you have? Plants require special lighting.

For fertilizer you can use Seachem liquid ferts. I dose nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, and trace once a week and use root tabs for the swords.

I'm not sure whether or not water wisteria requires co2, but you can either do a DIY yeast setup or pressurized co2. SOme people use liquid carbon but I don't know much about that. There's a good article on this forum about co2 supplementation, so you can give it a look.

 

[tiger terror]

Water wysteria doesn't require pressurized or diy co2 but you could dose seachem excel,it will grow very well in low to medium light..look for plant lighting between the 5500k to 7000k range( k=Kelvin)..

 

[_skyla_]

It would depend on your lighting as to which plants would do best. Theres a lot of low maintanence easy begginer plants. I only have basic low lighting that came built in with the kits. I use seachem liquid ferts once a week and thats it. They all did fine before i started using that though just thought id give them something extra. All plants have different requirements though. whats your lighting like?

 

[tiger terror]

It would depend on your lighting as to which plants would do best. Theres a lot of low maintanence easy begginer plants. I only have basic low lighting that came built in with the kits. I use seachem liquid ferts once a week and thats it. They all did fine before i started using that though just thought id give them something extra. All plants have different requirements though. whats your lighting like?

Some fully aquatic plants sold in stores are grown emersed not submersed,so its possible when your plants began to look more for the worse that they were going through the change to being fully submersed aquatic plants..this can take weeks if not longer..also a possibility that the lighting isn't sufficient as well..
A pic of my 10g planted,have other larger planted tanks as well..

 

[fort384]

Here are 2 basic articles that might shed some light on 2 aspects of keeping a planted tank:
Introduction to Fertilizing the Planted Tank - Aquarium Advice
Beginner's Guide to CO2 Injection in the Planted Tank - Aquarium Advice

 

[Laurie]

The lighting is the typical fluorescent light that came with the hood. Just looked at it..."17watt aquarium light". I can see now I am going to have to do MUCH research before attempting this!

 

[_skyla_]

The lighting is the typical fluorescent light that came with the hood. Just looked at it..."17watt aquarium light". I can see now I am going to have to do MUCH research before attempting this!

So I'd say your in the same boat plant wise as me. Hers some that work for me in low lighting and are very easy, java fern, java moss, ambulia, hornwort, water sprite, Anubias nana and other Anubias species would do fine also, vallisneria and i have more ill have to get back to you on. You don't need co2 for any of these in my experience or liquid frets if you have high enough nitrates for them to feed off. I have some of these plants on my fluval chi and they are doing fine and the lighting does such with those.

 

[Laurie]

Awesome! Thanks so much for the advice. I think I'll add one or two at a time and do the liquid ferts and go from there. I'm excited to get this started. Planted tanks are gorgeous!

 

[_skyla_]

Awesome! Thanks so much for the advice. I think I'll add one or two at a time and do the liquid ferts and go from there. I'm excited to get this started. Planted tanks are gorgeous!

They really are and its a good way to start learning about planted tanks starting out with these easy care low light plants And they do wonders in helping with the water quality. Also java fern and Anubias do well attached to driftwood or rocks so u can just use some cotton tie it in place and they will attach them selfs in time. You can do the same with java moss and other moss spread it out and tie it onto what you like and it'll attach and spread it looks lovely over rocks and covering driftwood Definatley try and get some water sprite super easy and I find it a great space filler it gives my tank that nice bushy full look and grows fast also it can be used as a floating plant and my fry love it. I also have some swords in there that look gorgeous and have grown heaps they have quite a large root system though so once you pick a spot it's best to leave them there or you'll end up pulling up everything around its roots aswell I found out the hard way haha It didn't bother me thou just shove it all back in place. I'm also going to try some root tabs for my plants just to see if they thrive more but like I said you don't need any off that usually with those plants