Planted tank with no nutrients or soil?

[Chelseabea]

Hi,



I'm trying to set up a small shrimp planted tank. I've added in a few plants including some java moss, hornwort, Egeria najas and some others. But I have no soil in the bottom. I've just used sand at the front and gravel at the back.



Will my plants die with no nutrients or should I buy some Aquarium Plant Food Fertiliser or something?



Thank you in advance.

https://ibb.co/iiomP9

 

[ZxC]

Those plants should get away with Seachem Flourish (following the directions on the bottle).

I would look at aquarium coop or Thrive "all in one" and follow their directions.

Plants will need all essential nutrients to thrive, otherwise they will be out competed by algae and will wither away / die.

 

[Delapool]

Plenty of people here use gravel / sand although I do feel soil is better. I’ve used gravel and plants do well, particularly once detritus builds up in it but they will mostly pull most nutrients from water column anyways.

 

[Fresh2o]

My shrimp tank has only a 1/8-1/4” layer of black sand. Plants include guppy grass, Fissidens fontanus moss, subwassertang, frogbit, and duckweed. Low to medium lighting. No fertilizers or supplements. Plants are growing and all except the moss require thinning out. None of these plants require substrate.

 

[kashif314]

Hi,



I'm trying to set up a small shrimp planted tank. I've added in a few plants including some java moss, hornwort, Egeria najas and some others. But I have no soil in the bottom. I've just used sand at the front and gravel at the back.



Will my plants die with no nutrients or should I buy some Aquarium Plant Food Fertiliser or something?



Thank you in advance.

https://ibb.co/iiomP9

You ll be fine. But better to use Seachem flourish comprehensive fertilizer or some other all in one fert.

 

[Fresh2o]

This is the tank I’m referring to. Normally I would recommend some type of fertilizer but in my case, (1) it’s a shrimp tank and I really don’t like adding anything to the water column and (2) I am constantly thinning out the excess plant growth with no ferts.
It was not always in this state. Early on, lots of string algae was present. I had to pull it out once a week and really reduce the lighting. Then it reached a balance of sorts and has been relatively maintenance free.

 

[JackBinimbul]

I use black diamond blasting sand and have a light to moderately planted tank. Java moss, java fern, anubias nana, bucephalandra, bacopa and ludwigia. It all grew fine for about a month, then I got ThriveS, the invert safe kind. There definitely has been improvement, but the plants weren't in danger of dying without it.

 

[ZxC]

Tanks can run fairly maintenance free, but it's never a bad bet to dose some sort of fertilizer. Plants require all essential nutrients to thrive, and fish waste alone is usually not enough (within reason).

Simply following the directions for Flourish Comprehensive is a safe bet to ensure easy / slow growing plants are getting what they need.

 

[kashif314]

I ve kept both caridinas and neocaridinas including the very difficult taiwan bees as well and with flourish comprehensive there won't be any harm to them. You can dose little than the suggested dosage. Plants will grow and thrive but when you add a basic fertilizer there color will stay good or otherwise you ll soon see yellowing of leaves. My dosage with shrimp tank was:

Saturday: Flourish Comprehensive and Seachem Potassium (flourish comprehensive doesn't include potassium)

Tuesday: Seachem potassium and Seachem Iron.

In your case you don't need extra dose of iron because flourish comprehensive has enough iron in it. Also you can also leave potassium as well but I suggest you do use it. You ll notice a noticeable difference in plants colors and growth when you dose flourish comprehensive and or potassium.

With shrimps don't use glut like flourish excel. I noticed they become less active with glut. But they are ok with little dose of fertz.