Am I on the right track?

K

ks_tetra

AC Members
Jun 19, 2006
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I just want to make sure I am in the right direction for my first attempt at a successful planted aquarium... I have a 20 gallon long that when filled with all the substrate/decor holds about 17 gallons.

Lighting: 1 Power-glo 24" 20 Watt lamp
1 Flora-gro 18" 15 Watt Lamp
on about 10-12 hours a day

Substrate: 25 lbs Eco-complete plant substrate

Fertilizer/Nutrients: Flourish Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium 1-3 times a week.Nutrafin Plant Gro fertilizer twice a week.

CO2: Nutrafin system (wasnt having luck with the activator/stabilizer so I used my own formula of yeast/sugar and a dash of baking soda-works great now)

Plants: Amazon Swordplant, Anubias, Elodea, Wisteria, Spatterdock

PH: around 7.0-water here is very hard

Ammonia: runs a little high, around 1.0-2.0 tap water has alot of ammonia so I just did a 50% water change with spring H20.

Temp: 78 degrees

Filtration: Fluval 204 cannister filter

**I only have a betta in there now but I want to add some cardinal tetras once I get my PH lowered a little. I also want to add a very small air pump. I also have no idea what my nitrites/nitrates are yet. Any advice would be much needed!!!!
 
Don't play around with the pH, 7.0 is not high and your fishes will adapt to it. Tetras will do fine in pH levels between 6.0 up to 8. CO2 may drive it down but don't tamper with it by any other means.

What's the ammonia level of the water out the tap? Your water may have chloramine and depending on the dechlorinator, it may be skewing your ammonia readings.

Everything else looks good. If you have alot of plants, especially the elodea and wisteria, I don't think you'll need to worry much about the nitrites and nitrates. Plants will consume them as they grow.
 
The ammonia out of the tap is about 1.0. I use aquasafe to treat the water. The PH out of the tap runs at about 7.8-8.2 which my cichlids love but I got my planted aquarium down to 7.0 by adding a PH buffer-but I wont lower it anymore if you think cardinal tetras will be okay:)
 
can i ask what the air pump is for?
 
I just purchased 10 cardinal tetras and 2 angelfish (small) I got a very small air pump so they have enough O2. Do I need to boost my CO2 now?

Thanks for the help again-I love this forum :clap:
 
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