trying to maintain planted aquarium!

CatPresley3

AC Members
Apr 7, 2008
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Austin
hello!

i recently upgraded to a 75 gallon tank and tried to move all my plants from the 30 gallon over, but nothing is making it.

i have fluorite substrate, coralife plant lights, and i'm using a fluorite supplement weekly.

do i need to look into co2 set up? what could be my problem?

could it be possible that it's my bristlenose eating everything and i'll never have nice plants? haha

also, i'm growing all my own plants since i'm afraid of a snail invasion!
where can i find bulbs online? i already tried my LFS and i can't seem to find anything here.... any suggestions? or maybe an online store that guarantees no snails in their already grown plants?

ideally i'd like my plant to be full of moss and tall surface skimming plants, but all i can manage are a few tall bulbs sparsely growing throughout the tank! thanks for any help!!

cat presley
 
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did you upgrade your lighting? What size was your old tank? you have to consider that if you change the size of the tank, this changes the depth of the water and subsequently makes it harder for light to get to plants (hence, at least in part, the whole wpg idea).

this is the first thing that comes to my mind. i'm sure the gurus will chime in shortly
 
Before even thinking of CO2, ensure at least 2WPG; if it's a deep tank (which a 75 gallon may well be) then perhaps more. No use adding milk if you're out of cookies.
 
Lighting will be key for starters. CO2 is more of a "fine tuning" IMO and shouldn't be worried about until lighting and ferts are figured out. What lighting do you have and are you adding ferts? What plants are in there?
 
PS---Bushy-noses and snails do not eat healthy plants.
 
bushy noses and snails dont eat healthy plants?

they prefer the dead, rotting, soft leaves.

I've noticed this already in my tank. The snails will munch on anything that's dead, but they don't touch anything living.

As for plecos, it depends. BN don't hurt your plants. Larger plecos will sometimes rasp on plant leaves, in particular the larger, "meatier" ones, but again this depends on the type of pleco and really the pleco itself.
 
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