First Live Plants

computerman0219 said:

Hello everyone, I am currently in the process of setting up a new 29gal tank :grinyes:. I was wondering what a good looking beginner plant would be, something that is cool looking, easy to maintain, and something that will not hurt my water conditioners. One other thing do I need anything else in order to keep the plants and fish healthy. NOTE: Doing a fishless cycle!!!:headbang2:

Click to expand...

java moss, java fern, anubias, and hortwort are good beginner plants that can live in many different light levels and dont need extra fertilization to survive.

Java moss, amazon sword, money wort, hornwort... my favs

Anubias attached to driftwood. A very slow growing plant, but adds a lot of elegance to a tank - and is very difficult to kill! Other than that, I am finding caururus cernuus to be an excellent tank starter plant (and grows at incredible rates), and also Rotala Sp.


EDIT: oddly enough I have grown all sorts of plants in my short time. But for the life of me, I cannot grow either java ferns, or amazon swords. It's very, very weird and confuses the life out of me.

It would take a long time and a relatively lower light intensity for an amazon sword to outgrow a 29g tank. Not to mention you can prune off the taller leaves and new ones will always keep shooting up. I would definitely go with a sword. You might also want to try echinodorus tenellus (chain swords) those make a wonderful carpet even under moderate light.

Java moss is rather foolproof however it can be messy when it starts to break off and float all around - it loves to clog filter inlets. Hornwort can be messy as well if there are any areas of it that don't get any light - it leaves lots of debris.

Some people have an easy time with vals. I haven't had any success personally, but I still recommend them.

SQUEAK said:

Anubias attached to driftwood. A very slow growing plant, but adds a lot of elegance to a tank - and is very difficult to kill!

Click to expand...

Anubias are great. My anubias and my water onion are the only plants I've never had any trouble with and they don't need any special care. They even travel well. When I got my anubias in the mail they looked so perfect, for a second I thought that I'd made a mistake and ordered plastic plants. I got them from this seller on ebay http://myworld.ebay.com/theplantstore

Odly enough just going and buying whatever plant I need to finish my aquascape has helped me, I have a free peice of javafern mat, 2 by 2 that is slowly recovering, about 20 wallmart bulbs, mostly lillys and apongeton, and java moss, and a MLP that is giving me h***. oh some vallls, next when I upgrade lighing I am going to get a tiger lotus. I also have plant substrate, and dose Kent plant and kent plant pro, twice a week. i'm in the procces of finding something that will poop to give the tank more TRATES reads 0 all the time. because 25 shrimp is like 1 guppy.

I added all after the cycle, and so far are growing pretty good, but I need more bio load, hoping that these srimp will breed soon...

and I have a freak snail that only comes out at night and likes to walk around on the water surface picking things up that I cant see hes so funny right now he is about 1\4 of an inch and doesn't go after plants.

Hitchhiker snails rarely if ever go after the plants. I've seen tanks that are literally overrun with them and the plants are all beautiful.