input on my new planted set-up

[Roland]

Ive found the advise Ive been given on keeping aquatic plants a wee bit conflicting, and was hoping for advice on what Ive done.

My tanks a 40 imperial g, with _

3 x 42" flourecent tubes (2 growlux, 1 sunglow)
undersoil heating
iron root tabs
50% pea gravel, 25% lacerite, 25% 'aqua grit' (clay based)
low filter turnover to maximise co2
4 x ottos for algae consumption

Also, the gravel is 3" in total.

Is there anything else I can do to maximise plant growth? The plants i am soon to get will be a mail order mix for the 48" aquaria.

Thanks in advance!!!

[aquatic-store]

addd some co2 thats about it with a reactor

marc
Http://www.Aquatic-store.com

Co2, Plants, Substrate, Filters, Heaters, UV and more

[carpguy]

You're a little light on light and don't mention CO2. Those two are biggies if you want to "maximize plant growth".

Or, your well set up for a low light tank. You won't see explosive growth but its workable, especially if you keep your plant selection towards lower light plants.

In either case you'll want to look a little further into ferts. Thats been the most complicated part for me and it takes a little while to digest it all.

[Roland]

yep, thanks for the replies.

I know a little about co2 but really cant afford a unit. I have my filter at minimum output ie. less tension on the waters surface, and Ive bought various floating plants for that reason. But thats about as far as I can go with that.

I maybe didnt phrase my post correctly, I just want my plants to be healthy and ' show up ' the shoaling fish that are going to be in there. (rummys) Im not too worried about maximum growth etc

Do you reacon they'll be Ok with that?
Thanks in advance

[Mantis_22]

heres a question that blends into all of this chat..

Do you need a CO2 device if you only say run 2-4 plants in a tank?

[carpguy]

Originally posted by Mantis_22
Do you need a CO2 device if you only say run 2-4 plants in a tank?

No.

Plants are largely made up of carbon and nitrogen. The figures that come to mind are 40% carbon and 30% nitrogen but they may be wrong. The point is that the plants need these things to build tissue. If you have only a few plants they'll be able to thrive with what's in there. As the plant load increases the demand for carbon increases, so folks add supplementary carbon.

There is a way around this: the natural lowlight planted tank.

If you keep the light modest (not insufficient), the plants can only grow to a given level. At this level the ambient carbon should be sufficient, especially if you let it generate on the substrate in the form of mulm. In nature a lot of the CO2 that the plants use comes from decomposing organic matter on the bottom. Lowlight folks feed extra food into modestly stocked tanks and don't scour the substrate with a gravel vac once a week. We tend to remove the carbon before it can cycle back in. Stuff like that. This is a low maintenance approach but you still need to pay attention to the rest of the ferts and be aware of what's going on. You could search for "low light" crossed with plantbrain to start. Like here (http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/search.php?s=&action=showresults&searchid=25923&sortby=lastpost&sortorder=descending).

If you want stronger growth and more plants and go and add stronger lights then the lights are no longer a limiting factor. And maybe you've gone and added all your ferts as well. But now the plants don't have enough carbon. So they can't use all the ferts you've got floating around in there. Algae will take advantage of this imbalance. One rule of thumb I've heard is CO2 for any tank over 2wpg. (Its a rule of thumb, add a grain of salt… generalizations have exceptions).

Seachem Excel is an option for modest carbon supplementation. DIY (http://www.qsl.net/w2wdx/aquaria/diyco2.html) is a popular option. Or pressurized.

Lights, fertilizers (macro and micro), and CO2 all need to stay balanced with each other. Low light, modest ferts, no CO2 works fine. High, high, high works as well. High, high, low doesn't work. If you want to get all that working together in a coordinated manner, start here (http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2529)

HTH

the carpfeller