# My first planted tank,



## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

well im moving out my midas's as soon as i find a buyer, and for that tank im gunna be able to finnaly have my pleco collection in there( i have i think 7 fancy plecos at the moment that are spread out in a quarenteen tank) and i wanna start a planted tank. i decided to come here and ask. i would like the help of some of yall expert(esp. twitch) to help me wit this(P.S. i will start a journal once this is setup)

ok so here is my condition, i have a 29 gallon tank(30x12.5x18) with a 24" standard bulb. i have 25 pounds of fine brown gravel. the tank has plenty of driftwood.

1)*LIGHTING* will i have to upgrade to a plant light? i have a 20 watt light, and thats the max i can get, is this enough?

2)*GRAVEL*will i have to buy a plant gravel? i have heard of some substrates for plants that u just put under ur regular gravel, what gravel do u recommend?

3)*CO2*i have thought of buying one of those yeast systems for like $20, but i spent that money on my filter. im thinking with 8-12 plecos i will have enuf CO2(plus theres gunna be more than just plecos), but will i see a noticable gain if i buy those CO2 tablets?do they work well?

4)*SPECIES* what species would u reccomend, i want easy things. some plants im thinking of are: java moss, amazon sword, duckweed,and anachris. is there anything i should add or take off that is easily taken care of?

thanks for all the help,im sure ill have quite a few questions on this


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## boozehound420 (Apr 18, 2005)

good questions, im almost at the same point as you in starting my first planted tank, ill be shur to check up on here when some pro give some advice


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## DiPpY eGgS (Mar 6, 2005)

when you say "standard lighting" what does that mean, a regular lamp bulb? If so, that probably won't work for any plants. 
If it is 20w flurescent, you are barely getting by, and should stick to just the very lowest light plants like java fern, java moss, amazon sword, and maybe a cryptocoryne or 2. Anacharis is an extremely high light plant, no matter what they tell you at the lfs. it will live for a good while, but it will be lanky and nasty looking. 
At any rate, you will need a bit of plant food like flourish every now and again (with your weekly water changes) to keep em fed.
CO2 will not be necissary with your lighting. If you wanted it anyway, it should help a bit, but I would go with 1 2liter bottle with the yeast/sugar/water method. it may be more trouble than it is worth with that lighting.
hope this helps for now


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

well im gunna buy a plant bulb, along with another 10-20watt setup. will 1wpg be enuf or should i do another 20 watt?i will put a lil bit of those CO2 tablets, just try em, there on sale. what about gravel? i will put plant food in. i want nice low light plants, will micro swords do good?


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## boozehound420 (Apr 18, 2005)

for lighting im goona be heading over to my local hydroponic shop to buy some metal halide, you wouldnt believe how overprised these lights are at fish stores, i dont know why but they think people in the fish hobbie are ballers

you should check out your hydro shop if you got one near you


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## DiPpY eGgS (Mar 6, 2005)

Tibs said:


> well im gunna buy a plant bulb, along with another 10-20watt setup. will 1wpg be enuf or should i do another 20 watt?i will put a lil bit of those CO2 tablets, just try em, there on sale. what about gravel? i will put plant food in. i want nice low light plants, will micro swords do good?
> [snapback]1066275[/snapback]​


I have no idea if the plant bulbs are happy in low light. 1wpg is perfectly enough for the lowest light plants such as some I have mentioned above and here.. http://www.plantgeek.net/plantguide_list.p...y=1&filter_by=2

CO2 is not necissary, but it should help to make the plants grow thicker/better.

Your plants will do better in smaller gravel, like pea gravel. I use flourish, but it is expensive, and it is for serious planted tanks. There are several planted aquarium substrates that are awesome, but in your case, I would get pea gravel, or the smallest you can find, it will do fine









Microsword is of moderate difficulty, and needs medium to strong lighting to do well. It also is quite prone to algea infection, so it is kind of a demanding plant. I'd stick to the ones on the link above. ~happy planting!


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

ok thank dippy, i will have 1 wpg, and i have gravel that isnt "plant substrate" but its smaller than pea, round the size of the O on the keyboard.i will start out wit maybe just a few lil easy plants, and see how it goez







c'mon keep this going


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## elTwitcho (Jun 22, 2004)

Didn't notice this until now, sorry for the late response.

1) Lighting - 24 inch standard bulb is 20 watts, on a 29 gallon that is simply inadequate lighting IMO. I would double that and add another 24 inch strip giving you 1.5 watts per gallon. This would be just about ideal for a starting setup such as yours, and you will be able to grow more plants than just anubias and java fern (you really don't have many options at .75 wpg).

2) Gravel - Plant gravel is good, I added some laterite to my regular gravel and the plants seem happy, however they seemed happy before so I can't really say if it's made a difference. Regular gravel will be fine so long as you aren't gravel vacuuming. It will build up a pretty thick amount of mulm under there (decaying organics) which the roots will use for nutrients. On this topic, this is why it is extremely important to do water changes after you disturb your gravel. All that decaying crap when released in the water column will almost certainly result in green algae blooms (believe me I know), so if you stir up your gravel in any significant amount, do a 50% water change immediately afterwards.

3) CO2 - No plecos won't really provide enough CO2 for high light setups, but for a setup like yours you won't really need any more CO2 than the amount that will disolve in your tank from the atmosphere and the small amount from the bioload in your tank (fish and nitrifying bacteria). Read my post "why a well planted tank doesn't have algae" for an understanding of growth limmiting factors, and when you understand that you should know that light will be your limmiter, not CO2 so you'll be fine.

4) Plants - Don't do duckweed. It will spread over the top of your tank like mad, and while your duckweed will grow great, it will choke the light out from all the other plants and it will be the only plant you have in there that's successful. Anacharis would work nicely, as would hornwort. Both are excellent at soaking up nitrates and choking out algae. Anubias are slow growers but will absolutely thrive in your setup, and some species of cryptocornes (sp?) will work nicely.


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

elTwitcho said:


> Didn't notice this until now, sorry for the late response.
> 
> 1) Lighting - 24 inch standard bulb is 20 watts, on a 29 gallon that is simply inadequate lighting IMO. I would double that and add another 24 inch strip giving you 1.5 watts per gallon. This would be just about ideal for a starting setup such as yours, and you will be able to grow more plants than just anubias and java fern (you really don't have many options at .75 wpg).
> 
> ...


thanks,i will take ur advice into definate consideration. my lighting i realize is low, i dont really have the money for another 24" strip, but maybe i can do sumfin to bring it up. so im guessing i need 1-1.5 wpg.well i alredy bought the gravel(petstore had sale, $6 for 25LBS, couldnt resist) so ill prolly just use that, and CO2 i realize i dont need. plant species i will look for the low light plants, and i do know about buckweed and how it over grows, ill either just pull some out if it gets too heavy or i just wont do it. thanks for the help, keep the advice comin


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

ok i just ordered a 24" 20 watt 4200K plant growing light, and i will hook that up to my light fixture and i will buy another 24" floresent light setup from menards and make a reflector and cut a whole in my top for the pre-exsisting 24" 20 watt standard bulb that came wit the tank. thatll make my wattage 40 watts, now even though 1/2 of that 40 watts isnt plant growing light, will this be enough?


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## Scarlet (Apr 15, 2004)

The tank is a 29g? So with 40 watts, I make that roughly 1.4 watts per gallon at best (someone correct me if I'm wrong on that - maths isn't my strong point!







). When setting up a planted tank, you're aiming for around 2 watts per gallon, really.

*Edit - just seen you'd already worked this out!*

Having said that, there's no reason why you can't keep real plants with 1.4 wpg. It just means you need to stick to species with fairly low light requirements, as elTwitcho says. There are many types of Crypt and Anubias which will thrive, as well as the old staples of Java Fern and Java Moss. Avoid anything with pink or red pigment in the leaves, as these tend to have very high light requirements.


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## Judazzz (Jan 13, 2003)

I'm not sure if I read your post correctly (somewhat hard to decypher), but are you planning to combine a pleco tank and a planted tank?
If so, don't have high expectations - many pleco species love plants for dinner, and can turn a planted tank into a waste land in no-time (for example: I kept one pleco with a huge appetite for plants, a Gold Nugget, in my 50g tank, and it took him a mere week to destroy all but a few plants).


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

Judazzz said:


> I'm not sure if I read your post correctly (somewhat hard to decypher), but are you planning to combine a pleco tank and a planted tank?
> If so, don't have high expectations - many pleco species love plants for dinner, and can turn a planted tank into a waste land in no-time (for example: I kept one pleco with a huge appetite for plants, a Gold Nugget, in my 50g tank, and it took him a mere week to destroy all but a few plants).
> [snapback]1069618[/snapback]​


hmmm this kinda concerns me, now u have real plants, how much probs do u have, i do have a gold nugget BTW that will be going in there.


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## Scarlet (Apr 15, 2004)

Golden Nuggets are plant destroyers. I have 4 Plecs in my planted tank, but none of them are very bad plant eating species.

Since you're not going to have very high lighting, you'll be going for plants like Java Fern, which few fish will touch because of their bitter taste.


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## Judazzz (Jan 13, 2003)

Tibs said:


> Judazzz said:
> 
> 
> > I'm not sure if I read your post correctly (somewhat hard to decypher), but are you planning to combine a pleco tank and a planted tank?
> ...


Yeah, it can end up in a big mess. Of course not all Nuggets are the same, but many Pleco's will eat plants if there are not enough algae, are not fed enough, or just because they like to eat plants.
The only plant that survives my Nugget is Java Fern: even tough and bitter plants like Anubias are destroyed, and soft plants such as Sword Plants or Vallisneria stand no chance whatsoever.
If your Nugget and/or other Pleco's develop a taste for plants, try planting your tank with Java Moss - even when using just one species of plant, it can still result in a very nice-looking tank (it can be planted in the gravel, but also attached to rocks or drift wood with a piece of fishing line). One big advantage is that Java Fern doesn't need a lot of light: pleco's highly prefer a dimmed tank, so the two are a good combo...


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

well thanks, ive alredy started wit the tank, right now my lil eigenmanni is in there cuz hes so small heed get lostin my 45. today i just set up the lights, i got a 20watt plant light, 4200K in the stock fixture, and i took the stock light and bought a light fixture at fleet farm and i rigged up to my tank, so i have 2 lights, equaling 40watts, one plant and one reg. i got my first to plants, a water lettace and a sword. they seem to be doing fine, but its only been like a day. i will have java moss, its prolly gunna be the next plant i have. im not to worried bout the pleco's eating it, if they do they do not much i can do. well anyways ill keep u guys updated, once i start the tank ill start a journal


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## benJii (Feb 17, 2005)

i know its kinda stupid to do an update so soon, but this i gotta tell.......well i got some water lettace u now, well 4 hours after i got its alredy sprouting a new clump


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## james__12345 (Mar 25, 2005)

Sagittaria and dwarf sagittaria will do good i have had them with one of those strip lights and the did fine, i have a few micro swords in that tank too, and i have no problems with them. i usually put the strip from my other tank on it part of the time now (i open the lid and sit it ontop of the hole). I use flourish and i have a diy co2 system i made with pvc pipe. (pm me if you want the plans for it) my amazon sword is doing awful. I have a compact sword that is doing great though. good luck


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