I have these guys in a 20 gallon with quite a few floating plants and one red tiger lotus that has leaves that sit at the surface. I think they will eat them the first few days, but they hide in stuff at the top of the tank. These guys are 3-4 weeks old-I had 4 or 5 of the females drop within days of each other and ended up with maybe 40-50 fry. I sold 20 and still have quite a few left AND there are more new fry that are a few days old and just started free swimming with the rest of the fish.
The fry don't have color yet and take a while to color up, but they are really pretty when they do!