want to have a planted tank- what do I need?

[chazsgirl]

to have plants actually live in my tank what do i need for them to live? name all accessories need, be patcient never done this before!

it will be a 20 gallon tank, snails and shrimp mostly

want plants like grass (don't know all the names yet)and maybe some pennywort & hornwort

[zzyzx85]

The most important thing is light. How many watts of lighting do you have over the tank? I think second is substrate. Someone with more expertise in plants might want to help me here.

[DAVIDFBT]

To grow pennywort and most grassy plants, you will need about 2 Watts per gallon. In your case, you will want 40 watts of light over your 20 gallon tank. A good medium light grass plant is Dwarf Sag. Sand is the best "cheap" substrate IMO.

[Bk718]

1- light.. check out coralife t5 lighting at bigalsonline. For around $36+ shipping you can get 1.8wpg over your tank. If you want more then theres the coralife power compact 65w light. Thats around $62-67+shipping.

2- substrate.. Can have regular or if you want to get fancy can go with eco complete-flourite

3- Filtration/water movement.. good to have both in a planted tank so you dont get algae..

For the plants you stated above as others said 2wpg should be fine

[chazsgirl]

I see alot of people talking about CO2, does that make much of a difference in my tank? could I just use an airstone or do I need something specific?

[Hurley]

co2 will make your plants grow faster and at higher light, it along with fertilizers can help keep your tank balanced and reduce algae. You can look into DIY co2 which is what most people start with. If you inject co2 you want to keep surface agitation to a minimum so you won't want a HOB filter and you wont want an air stone running. However, some people choose not to run co2 and have beautiful tank. They just tend to keep their lighting on the lower side.

I agree with the other posters on light, substrate and filtration. Another place you might want to check out for lights is ahsupply.com.

[chazsgirl]

I tried to do the whole plant thing with what I have now and they died, what am I doing wrong, is it the light? so the most important is the light?

[Hurley]

what's the wattage of your bulbs? It should say on them. Also, what kind of plants were you trying to grow?

[Ozymandias]

yes lighting is the most important thing, one you now what lighing you useing you can decide the rest of the tank

[Riiz]

I tried to do the whole plant thing with what I have now and they died, what am I doing wrong, is it the light? so the most important is the light?

I would say CO2 then lighting. Too much CO2 without the latter doesnt cause algae explosions. But switch it around and your ready to toss your algae experiment away after the first outbreak.

[chazsgirl]

my bulb is a 20w. so that's too low right?

[Hurley]

That would come out to 1 watt per gallon which is on the low side but that doesn't mean you can't grow plants. You just have to be careful about what plants you pick. I have 2 low light planted tanks that I love because they are easy to care for and very inexpensive. For a low light tank you would want to stick to anubias, certian crypts, java ferns and some of the mosses. There are other plants out there that do well in low light but you will have to do some research. If you bump your lighting up to 2 watts per gallon you will get a much broader selection of plants but you will start to need to add co2 and dose fertilizers on a regular basis and trimming becomes a regular thing too. Its really just depends on how much you are willing to put into the process and how much money you want to spend.