"Wizard's of Smart" Come one come all!

Moleen

Ok...

Plants.....hmmmmm good question! LOL! The ones that I know are an Amazon Sword, and Wisteria (floating). I have some green hairy stringy stuff that I tied to a decoration and a moss ball. I have two smallish pinky salmon colored plants , 5 types of stem plants and a few others. The plants seem to be doing well.

I tested the bottled H20 and it tested 0 for ammonia. My tap H20 tests .25 for ammonia. I add Prime. My nitrites are 0 and my nitrate is 5 (in my tank).

What type of snails should I buy and how many?

Do I have too many fish? Should I buy more plants? The thought of changing my substrate seems like a nightmare!

Should I do a complete H20 change and a vigorous substrate cleaning...this is hard because I don't want to disturb my plants.

Maxillius

alto i don't have ammonia in my tap i did had a problem with a small amount of ammonia at first in my aquarium and i believe it was due to over feeding, what I did was 15% water change on 2 days with out feeding and it was down to 0 on the third then i started feeding very small amounts twice a day and skipping a day on water changes
oh and also very important to remove dead leaves from plant since they add up to the load :)
and if you have too vaccume just do it lightly around the plants stems at the bottom, I keep a litle pit in the middle of 2 plants everything gaters there prety much so i can clean out easily if i have too

Boredomb

Just my 2¢ but I don't think you have to many fish. On the plants in my opinion more is better but that's just how I like tanks to look. Each their own there. When others have mention fast growing plants stem plants are best there. Wisteria is one that will grow fast provided it has the right amount of fertilizer and lights. " green hairy stringy stuff" I am going to assume is a type of moss. Probably Java Moss. That's a pretty slow growing plant but will still help. Amazon swords once again some what slow growers but can grow fast with the right type of setup. Anyways like I said I would add more plants just for the look of things but they do help out a lot.

On the gravel that's kinda big and doing a substrate swap is not that big of headache as some may thing. I have done it on 2 or 3 different occasions. With that size gravel I would make sure and do a good gravel vacuum and make sure no decaying matter is down in the cracks and grooves of the gravel. I think if you changed the gravel out with something smaller you would see a difference in how the plants grow and how the appearance of the tank will look.

On the snails the two I would suggest would be bladder snails and Malaysian trumpet snails. If you only want one type stick with the Malaysian trumpet snails as they will burrow into the substrate and break matter down making it easier for the bacteria to assimilate. Bladder snails do the same they just don't burrow. Now I don't know how well they will be able to burrow with the gravel you have. It might be to big for them to effectively do so. On how many well just a couple will do it as they multiple before you know it. They won't over take your tank if you don't overfeed but they will continue to breed as long as the food source is plentiful.

Bottom line here my advice is do a good substrate vacuum and think about redoing the substrate. Would also get some snails to help break down the decaying matter faster (if any is there. Chances are there is).

Byron

Malaysian Livebearing snails, sometimes called Malaysian Trumpet snails [their shells are conical and long] are in my view the best; they burrow through the substrate doing all sorts of helpful things. And only one or two, they are livebearing and will multiply.

I'm not puzzled by ammonia considering its in your tap water, but it should be dissipating after a couple days. Your plants will help, stem plants especially as Boredomb said.