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Im setting up my 75g for a west african setup. I have some very fine black sand in. What some plants that might do well in sand. Im already gonna plant some anubias on the drifwood.

greenmonkey51,

Not too many plants do well in sand, to my knowledge. Anchoring plants on rock/wood seems to be a good idea.

Now help me out - what is a "West African Setup"? What kind of fish go in there? What is the ph and hardness for such a setup?

Ingo

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Most plants with fine roots will not survive in the sand as the sand does not give them a good water circulation. It also can crush the fine roots.

I also agree plants tied to DW and rocks would be the best choice.

Have a look in [link=My Profile] http://www.fishprofiles.com/forums/member.aspx?id=1935[/link] for my tank info

Look here for my
Betta 11Gal Desktop & Placidity 5ft Community Tank Photos

Keith

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I also agree, plants attached to decor would probably be the best way to go...
- java fern
- java moss
- anubias
- african fern
- other ferns
- other mosses
- etc

You could also try some floating plants (or stem plants that can float)...
- hornwort
- anachris
- mosses maybe
- nitella gracilis
- water sprite
- etc

How much light is in the tank, BTW?

Some plants that do well planted in sand, in my experience, are: crypts, swords, and jungle val.

I have a 75 gallon with black Tahitian Moon sand, which is very fine. The substrate is no more than 1" deep and I have MTS's to keep it aerated. When I kept a lot of apple snails in the tank (which are fertilizing machines) the val grew so fast I was pulling out bags of it weekly. The swords actually surprised me by how well they're doing. Everyone says they need really deep substrates, but it's not necessarily true.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v245/SSanchez/3-27-2006047.jpg

I don't have a good whole-tank shot. But, I think that pic illustrates the volume of vegitation, as well as the depth of the substrate in the tank.

Wow Georgia

That is some nice looking tank . I am one of these people that tell others thata thin layer, like your 1 inch, would not be suited to grow swords, as they develop rather larger root systems. So, how do you do it ?

Did you get the plant when it was small and was it never moved?
Do you have any idea how far the root system spreads throughout the tank, given that it cannot grow downwards?

In any case, I would really love to see more pictures of your lovely tank (and your tiny catfish ), it seems to be very nice. Maybe you can create your own thread in the planted tank forum and share your experience there with us.

Thanks,

Ingo

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club

Well thank you LITTLE_FISH. It's nowhere near as stunning as yours, and others that have been posted here.

A few more stats on the tank: no CO2, no ferts currently, weekly 50% water changes and a total of 110 watts of CF light (1.5 wpg). Here's a shot from September:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v245/SSanchez/IMG_1130.jpg

The water kind looks cloudy in that one... but it was the only one I have on the computer.

In the above pic, the sword on the left side was put in the tank right after it was set up, as a very small plant. It took several months before I saw a lot of growth. But once it got settled it sprouted new leaves every few days. Unfortunately, it was such a tall species the leaves would float on top and shade a lot of the bottom. I pulled it out and threw it away a month ago I just don't have a tank tall enough for it. The root system probably covered half the tank at that time, and it had been there about a year.

The sword on the right came from my 29 gallon. After basically re-leafing due to higher light, it's done very well, and has been there for maybe four months.

The sword pictured in my previous post also came from my 29 gallon (to replace the one I threw away). It had just flowered and produced a bunch of baby plants before I moved it.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v245/SSanchez/3-27-2006008.jpg

Since the root system was so large, I had to use a rock to keep it down. It's now re-leafing with smaller, more compact leaves due more light, but doesn't appear to be stressed. The baby plants are still hanging out.

My marginal sucess with the tank is entirely due to the wealth of information on this forum. In the beginning there was so much red and blue-green algea I wanted to give up. But I posted about my problems and the members here were very, very helpful.

greenmonkey51,

Sorry that I sidetrack this thread a little. I know I shouldn't do this but Georgia deserves a quick response to her last entry. Can you forgive me?

Georgia:

It's nowhere near as stunning as yours, and others that have been posted here

Are you kidding me? As soon as I saw the picture I had a style in my head: Rhonda Wilson's Natural Aquariums

I like it very much

Ingo

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Proud Member of the New Jersey Aquatic Gardeners Club