Ten gallon Planted

hopwood83

hopwood83

AC Members
Apr 30, 2008
10
0
0
42
I had an idea to make a ten gallon planted tank. I was wondering about some certain things.
What type of filtration
What type of substrate
Recommended plants for beginners
Preferred lighting
Suitable tank mates
And any other suggestions you might have
thanks for your help
 
Filtration:
Can go for a HOB filter like AquaClear. I have AC30 myself on the 10g and it works great.
Or you can get yourself a canister filter, though some are expensive you can try looking at 501 canister filter or toms rapid canister filter. Either of these will run you around $22-35

Substrate:
You can go for plain gravel. Or spice it up and get flourite, eco complete, soilmaster select, aquasoil. Thats personal preference. I had plants grow great with just regular gravel, so getting fancy isnt always important

Lighing:
For a 10g I would get a incandescent light fixture and add 2-14w compact fluorescent bulbs giving you 2.8wpg (watts-per-gallon) which is enough to even make some plants red.. This fixture can be found at walmart or even petland discounts

Plants:
If you get the lighting such as the one i previously stated then nothing is stopping you. You can go from java moss to some dwarf hairgrass to other medium light plants.. You can use this website to get some plant information www.plantgeek.net

Tank mates:
I would go for a school of tetras and maybe some cory cats, but thats totally up to you. You can also do shrimps with snails and some smaller fish..

Suggestions:
If you do get the lighting such as the one stated above I would also try looking into making a do-it-yourself CO2 (yeast/sugar/water mix) and maybe looking at some liquid/dry ferts.

Also if you do get plants, try and get as much as you can right away, so that way the tank cycles faster and you get less of a chance for an algae outbreak..
 
First of all, welcome to Aquaria Central. This is a great place to get info from people who really care for their tanks and the fish. in them. They are more then willing to help anyone out with any question or questions they may have.

A ten gallon tank is a nice size for a first time planted tank. What kind of filter depends on the plants you want to keep. If you go hi-tec and do it complete with co2 injection then stay away from filters that have bio-wheels. If you go lo-tec and low lighting then co2 injection will in most cases not be needed. In that case you can have whatever filter that you want to run on this tank. A simple HOB (hang on back ) will be fine. The Aquaclear series of filters are highly recommended. It should work fine for your set up. As far as lighting goes, in order to grow plants successfully, in a low tec tank with low to medium lighting, you want to shoot for 1.5-2-5 watts of light per gallon of water. The usual lighting that comes with most tanks is not sufficient to grow much of any live plants.A small upgrade in your lighting may be needed.

You can use whatever substrate you like provided it will let the plants grow in it and the fish like it. Aquarium gravel is used most commonly. You can also use some kinds of sand such as play sand.The plants will grow in either one of these substrates.You could also go for something like eco-complete or flourite which is a special substrate just for live plants but it is not mandatory.

Easy plants to start with that do not require a lot of light are java fern, java moss,most crypts, anubias and vals.

Good luck with the new tank and be sure to post pictures when you have everything up and running.

Marinemom
 
I also want to add that as far as the fish are concerned, you want to stay with fish that are appropriate for a ten gallon tank. I want to suggest fish like small tetras such as neons or cardinals or if you want live bearers you could go with some endlers. If you do not want any of those suggestions, you might want to consider a small school of small cories such as panda cories or peppered cories. You could even go with shrimp such as cherry shrimp. They are very colorful and quite entertaining to watch especially in a planted tank.

Marinemom
 
hopwood83 said:
I had an idea to make a ten gallon planted tank. I was wondering about some certain things.
What type of filtration
What type of substrate
Recommended plants for beginners
Preferred lighting
Suitable tank mates
And any other suggestions you might have
thanks for your help
Click to expand...

:welcome:

My .sig below has the set-up for my 10g tank, and so far things are going quite well. In fact, the plants have grown so much they really need a trimming this weekend.

For tank inhabitants, a small school of rasboras (small ones like r. heteromorpha) and some shrimp would be pretty.
 
thanks for all your help
i was planning on going with a t5 fluorescent which would give me 4wpg
my water is very hard getting close to 15kH but i have to soften it for my other tanks so that is not that big of a deal. and as for the temperature i was planning on stting it where you guys tell me to, because i have no idea what it should be set at. As for fish i was thinking either cardinals of fancy guppies
thanks again for you help and i will post my pics as soon it is up and running.
thanks
 
The temp. for the fish you listed should be in the 77-78 degrese on the farenheight scale range.

Marinemom
 
Welcome to AC!

For a 10 gallon tank you don't have to worry too much about watts per gallon. You can start with a cheap incandescent hood, and put spiral flourescent lights in it instead of the incandescents. It's cheap and you'll be able to grow the low to medium light plants.

I have a lightly planted 10 gallon tank with a honey gourami, 7 cardinal tetras, 3-4 otocinclus, and a few cherry shrimp. You can see the details here: http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=148544&highlight=downgrading

You'll have to click the Attached Image links to see pics.
 
Planted 10 gallons are a lot of fun! Take a look in my sig for some good example of plants that have done great so far in my tank.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom