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OK guys and gals,

In the next month I will be starting a new 55 gallon tank. I want it to be a planted tank but I know nothing about keeping the plants alive and eqipment I will need. Ok so here come the questions..... What special eqipment will I need for this planted tank?.... What chemicals are good to help keep plants alive and flourishing?..... What about substrate?..... What kind of filtration and heating do planted tanks require?.....Do planted tanks require a special way of cycling?.....How long should I cycle the tank before adding plants and animals?.....
This is how I am going to stock it:
1.)a few varieties of tetras
2.)Rams
3.)small things like shrimp and ottos
4.)A group of panda cories
5.)Platies
Does this sound good?
I Just really want to do my research before starting this tank so that I dont screw it up.
Thanks for any help!

Hi,
Have you read the article at the top of this forum?
It answers much of what you ask. Reading
will also help. Pick up one or some of the books
mentioned in that thread and read it(them).

For the fish that you mention you will need a heater
For the fish that you mention you will want to keep the
temperature of the water between 74 and 78 degrees which
will be fine for just about any plant that you can get
hold of.

For the size tank that you have and the projected stocking
level you could use either a large HOB or a canister type
filter. You want to turn the water over about 4 times
in an hour and that should be fine for just about
any plant. Too much current and the plants will have
problems. Too little current and dead spots develop that
will cause other problems.

Essentially, you need to decide how deep your pockets are
and if you want a low light, "low tech," tank without CO2
injection, or, if you want a "high tech" high light tank
with CO2 injection. Keeping your lighting at 1 to 1.5
watts per gallon (wpg) is considered low light and
you should purchase only low light plants.
Increasing the wpg to between 2 and 3 gives you more
variety and brings you into the medium light demand plants
as well as the low light plants, and even some high light
demand plants. Generally speaking, if you go over 3+ wpg,
then you will need to add CO2 injection to the tank and
at 55G, it is easiest to use a bottled system instead of
a DIY system.

If you stick with the low light or even medium light tank,
with the projected fish load, you may not need to add
fertilization. The fish and fish food may take care of that
for you. Once the tank is stocked, and planted, and things
settle down (the tank ages) your plants will tell you if
they need any fertilization and there is a site to help
you determine what is needed.

Hope this helps,
Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

hey platy im looking to do the same soon. i have a 29gal with some zebra danios and neon tetras, im going to add some emerald cories soon. but im looking into a low light planted tank

*click *flash *click "whered he go???"

There is no special cycle for planted tanks. You could however, plant very densely from the begining and very few fish. From what i hear, this works very nice. I have not actually tried this method myself though. I have 2 planted tanks. Both were started out the usual way- by adding a small group of hardy fish. I just gradually acquired the plants that i wanted over many weeks time. It really depended what my LFS gat in.
As for chemicals, just a basic dechlorinater will be good. I use Seachems Prime. It lasts a long time and it is priced about the same as others. You may want to consider Fluorish Excel. It works pretty good in my tanks. You may need other suplements depending on wheter you will have a high lighting tank.
If you go with low lighting, at leaste get a glass hood that way you can get a double strip light which will give you 80 watts, just under 1.5 watts per gallon.

Thanks so much FRANK and CLOWNLOACHFAN. I was thinking I would just do moderate and low lighting plants as I dont want to deal with the co2 and what not. What would you guys suggest as a hardy "cycling" fish? Maybe a few of the platies I already have? thanks again freinds.

hey platy i have had a good experience with zebra danios as cycling fish... i didnt lose a single one during cycling

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Thanks sodaaddict I will keep that in mind. Well today I got the stand so soon will be the tank and filter ....ect. So is there any other equipment I need to invest in for a planted tank? Also while I got the stand today I was looking at lights. I found one called FLORASUN. Is this a good one? It seemed pretty good to me. Thanks again guys and gals!

Hi,
I hope that by "sand" you were talking about the aquarium
"Gravel" and not really sand. Sand in a aquarium can cause
tremendous problems.
Just about any light that has the word(s) SUN or DAY LIGHT
are great for planted aquariums.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

O ok thank you. Any more suggestions for cycling fish?

What would you guys suggest as a hardy "cycling" fish? Maybe a few of the platies I already have?

I have used platies as cycling fish several times with good success.

Cheers
TW

Thank you Robyn, Im gald to hear that as I dont want to have to go out and buy more fish when I can just use some of my platy colony.
Now I have a few more questions about plants. Right now I just have to large hornworts in the current 17 gallon I have. I got these as I read they dont really reguire much light at all. And from what I have obsered they really dont (they doubled in size in a week with jsut a regular aquarium light I have). But one is growing so big it is at the top of the water and turning back around lol. How do I trim them so I dont kill them and so they dont look bad? Can I plant the clippings? This will also help when I plant my 55 gallon. Thanks again for the help friends!

http://plantgeek.net/plantguide_viewer.php?id=50

I've never had hornwart, but guess you mean the above plant. If it's like a typical stem plant, this is how you trim.

You need to uproot the plant & remove it. You trim it from the bottom & then replant the top part of the stem. You can replant the bottom part also.

Good luck

Cheers
TW

Ok thank you. I didnt know it would be that easy! So I guess thats how you guys get all your platns! lol. Ok well I will let you all know when more questions come up. Thanks again for all the help I fell way better about starting this tank now.

Wait one question. I can add plants to an uncycled tank and it wont harm them right?

I can add plants to an uncycled tank and it wont harm them right?

Correct. My tanks have plants straight away. Most of the gang on the planted tank forum recommend heavily planting with fast growing stems from the get go. They should even help you in the cycling process, as plants suck up the nutrients (waste) in the water.

Here's just one link I found talking about cycling with plants. I don't think I agree this means you don't need to cycle, but I definitely think plants help the cycle process along. http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plants/month.200207/msg00100.html

Cheers
TW

Ok sounds cool. I just used you advice and trimmed my hornwort. They look great now! Thanks again

Well a few more questions,

After reading some of the logs on here (Little_Fish, tetratech, and Robyns) I have a few more questions. Does it matter really what kind of filter plants have (canister or HOB)? Also I saw the word FERT come up, what is this? Also I saw things where people were talking about lighting hours, how does this work? I also saw something that looked like a co2 tank?

Also I am having a problem of my own, I cant keep the algae from staying off my live plants, I thougt live plants were supposed to reduce algae? Thanks for the help.

ok well i havent started to plant my tank yet but i have been doing a lot of reading on it, and looking up different kinda of plants... etc, etc, well the term "FERTS" is fertilizers ie. substrate fertilizer like laterite. along with liquid fertlizers, and other drop in stuff. and lighting hours is reffering to the amount of time the lights are on. yes that is correct you did see a co2 tank. co2 is a fertilzer needed when running higher lighting. co2 to a plant is like oxygen to a human. humans breath 02 and breath out c02, plants are the opposite the breath c02 and ehale 02. <--(during photosynthesis) at night when light is not available, does respiration which is the reverse.

*click *flash *click "whered he go???"

So what would be the lighting hours of a low to moderate light tank? Would I have to have a co2 tank for this tank?