I need help planning first planted tank

JMILLER

The only one that I didn't get like I wanted was the Wisteria. I have a bunch of plants in a very small space and they are very intertwined. If I moved my arm to fast in the water the current would up root them. It was almost 2 hrs. moving plants today, I'm leaving them for now.

Angel079

Wisteria is not the easiest to plant; I pers don't like that plant long term in my tanks lol. But if all others come up THAT easily just by you moving your hands in there...How much gravel do you have in there, kinda sounds a lil like its not deep enough?

JMILLER

Where it is planted it's about 2-2 1/2". I think it has more to do with my gravel. If I had to do it over again I would have gone for black sand or much smaller gravel.

Angel079

Yea stem plants have a hard time with larger gravel indeed; best bet is really gravel sized around 2-3mm or as you said sand. Up until recnetly I actually never worked with black sand; but did so for my shrimp and I'm loving it!

Mean Harri

If I ever do another tank I may try the Flourite black sand by Seachem. It seems like goo stuff. Here's a link to check it out.
http://www.seachem.com/Products/prod...BlackSand.html

JMILLER

Yep that's the stuff. Nobody around me carried it and at the time I wasn't thinking of ever using live plants. One of these days I'll probably break down and redo this one with it but not anytime soon.

Zeetrain

Sorry to leach on to this post but i have a 15 watt flourescent tube light on one of my tanks and im thinking of planting a new tank and I was wondering if that would work well.
Your tank looks great by the way. I think the plant on the rock looks very cool.

JMILLER

I have a total of 17 watts over the tank and it's a 10 gallon. With the way it's planted, all to one side, I'm sure it's actually less. The only problem I see so far is the Ludwiga is starting to lose it's red color but the plant is healthy.

Angel079

@Zeetrain you need to not only lok at teh wattage but more importantl for plants look at the spectrum - Essentially its the coloration the light gives off and plants thrive better in bluer lights then in yellow-red lights.

@JMILLER I think you seen my Ludwigia in the 55g Diary thread hadn't you?
What I noticed is that the plants closest to the spray bar / outlet of your filter are THE most vivid colors. So check if there's a way for you do plant yours closer to the output of your tank. Don't ask me why they do this - But I can tell you they just do
Also important is the spectrum; they reflect the light they receive if you will. Now if you have super high end blue or maybe even purple lights (anywhere from 7-8000K) they won't be too red. If you have lower Kelvin rated lights (I'd have to look again I think my 55g gets 5800K) there's more red in the mix of light for them.

Hoep this makes sense and I didn't confuse no one right now.

JMILLER

Here is a two week update. They are showing some growth even though I have started the fert yet. I'm still having problem with some of the stem plants lifting but nothing is floating.

Freshly planted:



A few minutes ago: