Am I doing this right?

[blue2fyre]

So I found a 5 gallon tank on the side of the road and decided to set up a little betta tank for my studio. I have a piece of driftwood in there with sand+ gravel covering the bottom. I went to the LFS and picked up two cheap low level plants that the sales lady helped me pick out. I have some moneywort and hornwort(which I like a lot better). The tank's been up and running for about 2 weeks now with a desk lamp that has a compact flourescent light in it. Everything seems fine so what now?

I'm going VERY low tech here because the tank is so small (and I'm so new). I would like to add some java moss to the drfitwood but I'm afraid it would be too much.

[Arturo]

Now you sit back and relax. :)

[jpappy789]

How did you cycle this tank?

[blue2fyre]

The driftwood came from my 55 gallon and I used water from my 55 to fill up this tank THEN I put a bit of filter media in the new filter

[DAVIDFBT]

Water from a cycled tank holds very little beneficial bacteria and it is dirty, you should have used new water, but since you already filled it up, don't worry about it. Go ahead and add the java moss to the wood, it will end up absorbing some of your nitrates, not to meantion it will look good in the tank.

[evelyn80]

u found a tank on the road? lucky! also go ahead and add the moss itll look sweet! u could also try a java fern if ya wanted to

[blue2fyre]

Well I added the water from my other tank because it was stable in temp. I keep very regular maintenance on that tank so few nitrates are seen. Since then I've done a water change on this tank a couple times using new water.


So the java moss is ok? That's good I really like the way it grows on the driftwood. I was worried about the tank being too planted where I could run into problems.

So what about fertilizer? Do I need that?

I'll post some pictures once I get some better ones :)

[Shocker6966]

Besides occasionaly trace elements, I wouldn't worry about ferts. Hornwort is an awesome water condition indicator as well as a very efficient nitrogen sponge. In an environment with excessive nutrients, you can literally watch it grow. When I first started my planted tank and their wasn't enough overall growth to take full advantage of the nutrients, the hornwort would grow 6" or more overnight.

[jpappy789]

:iagree:

Neither plant is really demanding.