Plant stock help

[giffmastaflex]

I'm planing on buying the finnex ray 2 ds which is high light, for my 55 gallon. I have pool filter sand as the substrate. I would like to know what plants I should buy( what will look neat), and where to buy them. Also what should I expect to spend on the plants? My tank looks like the pic below.



I want it to be full of plants on the opposite side of the wood, and have the other side lightly planted.

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

You'll be at around 70 PAR at substrate... It's slightly below high light, since what's considered medium light is between 30 to 80 PAR. With that said, you'll be able to grow almost any plant. I'd highly recommend a good fertilizer regimen like EI or PPS-PRO dosing (dry ferts) and CO2 (or lots of glut)... otherwise you'll get a good amount of algae. Also, since sand is inert, it would help to have root tabs.

You should get a bunch of fast growing stem plants like ludwigia and rotala species. You can get some foreground carpeting plants like S. Repens, Hydorcotyle sp. Japan, DHG, HC, or something of that sort. Blyxa Japonica is a nice midground plant. There's so many plant options the best thing to do is research. More importantly have fun!

 

[bshenanagins]

You'll be at around 70 PAR at substrate... It's slightly below high light, since what's considered medium light is between 30 to 80 PAR. With that said, you'll be able to grow almost any plant. I'd highly recommend a good fertilizer regimen like EI or PPS-PRO dosing (dry ferts) and CO2 (or lots of glut)... otherwise you'll get a good amount of algae. Also, since sand is inert, it would help to have root tabs.

You should get a bunch of fast growing stem plants like ludwigia and rotala species. You can get some foreground carpeting plants like S. Repens, Hydorcotyle sp. Japan, DHG, HC, or something of that sort. Blyxa Japonica is a nice midground plant. There's so many plant options the best thing to do is research. More importantly have fun!

I wouldn't recommend staur. Repens as a carpet plant. It will require excessive pruning and high light to avoid growing vertically, great plant but not easy to carpet. Anything you want to carpet I'd avoid any fish that like to rummage through the substrate or you will have more floaters than a carpet

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

You don't necessarily have to have S. Repens as a carpet. It looks very nice as mid-foreground too in clusters. I have it in 3 tanks. It will do fine with the OP's lighting.

Here's my S. Repens growing under about 70 PAR right behind the UG and in from of the AR mini.

 

[bshenanagins]

You don't necessarily have to have S. Repens as a carpet. It looks very nice as mid-foreground too in clusters. I have it in 3 tanks. It will do fine with the OP's lighting.

Here's my S. Repens growing under about 70 PAR right behind the UG and in from of the AR mini.

Wow those are HUGE. I like it but its not a "runner" plant that's all it is very pleasing to the eye regardless. I've never seen it that large are you sure that's S. Repens? Lol

 

[Brian_Nano12g]

Well I can snip the tops off and replant them. They're growing fairly compact with my lighting. And yes, 100% sure they are staurogyne repens. Google image it and you'll see a bunch of examples.

 

[Rivercats]

IMO using groupings of plants with different leaf shape, color, and texture really makes a tank pop. If you google Dutch style aquariums you'll see some wonderful examples. My 220g shows this and also has 2 large pieces of DW worked into the scape.

Plant's that would work well in your tank:

Rotala's: Wallichii, Macrandra, Vietnam, Mini Butterfly, Indica, Glandulosa
Ludwigia's: Atlantis, Senegalensis, Red, Repens, Cuba
Limnophila hippuroides
Cabomba Purple or Furcata
Hygrophila corymbosa Angustifolia
Alternanthera reineckii
Pogostemon Erectus

These are just a few of the stem plants you could grow along with Swords, Crypts, Lotus Red or Green, and other bulb plants.

For ferts I would suggest:

You need 3 dosing bottles found at the bottom of this page... http://greenleafaquariums.com/aquarium-fertilizer.html.



This is a good thread about dosing PPS-Pro. Only read the opening post not all the comments after it.... http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/forumapc/pps-analysis-feedback/39491-newbie-guide-pps-pro.html.



There are two things I do different from the article. First I use 3 dosing bottles as I split the macro nutrients for better custom dosing to the needs of the tank. Nitrates in one bottle, phosphates and potassium in one bottle, and micro's in the 3rd bottle. The other thing you'll notice the recipe calls for using MgSO4, magnesium sulfate, which you don't need if you have hard tap water with a Gh and Kh of 4 or higher.

Then as suggested you need to use either pressurized CO2 or a high dose of liquid carbon daily.

 

[giffmastaflex]

Thanks for the info but how do I know the PPS-Pro is right for me? Aren't there other types of dry fertilizer?

 

[Rivercats]

Thanks for the info but how do I know the PPS-Pro is right for me? Aren't there other types of dry fertilizer?

You can dose El or PPS-Pro but dry ferts are all the same. Just depends on what you think you want to do. Here's a good thread that was going a couple days ago which talked about both...

http://www.aquariumadvice.com/forums/f24/pps-pro-estimative-index-etc-281738-3.html#post2717503