# Getting ready for a LARGE plant order....



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

And I could really use eveyones input on plants. Whatever you suggest, I want it to be from JDAquatics, to support a forum member and because of the IMPECCABLE service other people have mentioned.

His store can be found HERE, listing everything for sale.

Ok, first, about my tanks. I have (2) 20 gallon divided tanks and (2) 10 gallon tanks. I want underwater forests for my boys. One of the 20 gallons is fairly well planted but there's a lot of open space. The other 20 gallon, I just lost all my plants. One 10 gallon isn't even planted yet and the other 10 gallon has 3 Belhari and a little bit of Anubias on drift wood and aside from a big ol swath of moss, he has no hiding places lower in the tank where it's not as bright.

The lighting is medium to low, depending on the tank. they all have at least one 6000-6500K LED bar on them, then the 20 gallons have full spectrum t5 florescent lights, extra LED's on the planted 10 gallon, and a CFL desk lamp on the non planted soon to be planted. 

They're all based with Eco-Complete Planted, and will all have a little Flouite mixed in too, it's worked WONDERS for the well planted 20 gallon so far. I dose the water with Equilibrium since I have softened water, and then i dose with basically the FULL line of Flourish.

I want a few areas of thick, dense, leafy plants for my boys to swim around in and rest in. I want a little bit of open space for them, mostly for me tho so i can see them. but other wise, I want the entire back half+ of the tank to be a dense forest, and one whole side of the tank to be rather well planted as well, and then have the front quadrant to have the driftwood and swimming space. My order is bound to change by what he does and doesn't have available next week when i go to order, but this is my current "wish list" I suppose you could say, and I would LOVE your input. (I would rather order too many and have to, oh no! plant one of my spare tanks!!) than order conservatively and have to wait forever for the tank to really, really fill out. 

The Wish List is, Currently:
(3) Moneywort
(6) Java Moss (I just lost like, 1.5lbs of the stuff)
(12) Golden Lloydiella
(6) Rotala nanjenshan
(3) Rotala Wallichii
(6) Myrio
(6) Red Myrio
(6) Baby Tears
(12) Amazon Sword
(12) Red Flame Sword

What do you think??? __________________


----------



## Watermelons (Jul 21, 2015)

Wow what a selection.
I wish it wasn't such a PITA to get plant matter from US to Canada


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I wish it weren't in PITA to get plants in Alaska....

Even tho its a little easier for me to order than you, it still costs and arm and a leg and maybe the big toe on the other foot in order to have it shipped... 
SO I figured, if I'm going to place the order, I need to make it worth my while to have it shipped lol


----------



## Tree (Sep 29, 2013)

I just ordered Rotala Wallichii from http://shop.plantedaquariumscentral.com/ I wonder if they shed. 

anyway That list sounds GREAT! What I would do is sketch out your idea on a aquascape on paper and go from there. that is what I did for my 5.5 gallons.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I always make sketches... and then I never plant it like I think I will because suddenly I'm like, "I hate the way that looks...." and then I just move it all around anyway lol


----------



## Tree (Sep 29, 2013)

Hahah so true!


----------



## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

Don't know about all of the plants but I can tell you 99% of mine are now from JDAquatics and all arrived and remain healthy and growing. Some of the ones you mention I can't grow because my water is too hard so they should do great for you.

I love the* Red Flame Swords *I received and the *St. Elmo's Fire* if he has any of those. The tissue cultures do extremely well for me. And any potted Anubias because there's enough root that you can actually plant. I have both *Narrow and Broad Leaf *and have them front and center. The *Golden Lloydiella *does really well for me.


----------



## Tree (Sep 29, 2013)

oh that was another one I was thinking about getting, Golden Lloydiella! man your tank will look beautiful with those plants FinnDublynn.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

RussellTheShihTzu said:


> Don't know about all of the plants but I can tell you 99% of mine are now from JDAquatics and all arrived and remain healthy and growing. Some of the ones you mention I can't grow because my water is too hard so they should do great for you.
> 
> I love the* Red Flame Swords *I received and the *St. Elmo's Fire* if he has any of those. The tissue cultures do extremely well for me. And any potted Anubias because there's enough root that you can actually plant. I have both *Narrow and Broad Leaf *and have them front and center. The *Golden Lloydiella *does really well for me.


He did have soe St. Elmo's fire, tho I think that was one of the ones that had only like 2 left, and I didn't bother putting it on the list cause it could be sold out in the next week... Or maybe it was one of the ones I just decided against but I'll take another look at it.

What's nice with having the SOOOOFT water, is that since I add back in the Equilibrium, I can actually customize how soft and hard the water is by adding more or less, tho i usually keep it about a nice mid-range.

I'm not familiar enough with tissue cultures to feel comfortable trying them right now, I'm sure I'll just kill them off. And I'm actually NOT a big fan of the Anubias, the leafs look to plastic-y and fake to me... they're a nice plant, tho, the are. I just dont like the aesthetic look


----------



## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

Tissue cultures are easy. The only difference is they are always disease and pest-free. You treat them the same as any other plant except you wash off the gel. I'm ordering several of Jacob's tissue cultures now listed. The other advantage is you can let them sit around and plant last.

You can also email with "wants" and if he can get them for you he will.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Tree said:


> oh that was another one I was thinking about getting, Golden Lloydiella! man your tank will look beautiful with those plants FinnDublynn.



I hope so!! Right now I have to deal with whatever I can get at my local petco.. and while i know they get plants on wednesdays, when I go to pick out fresh new plants, i'm ALWAYS disappointed... 

They seem to only ever have some Amazon Swords at a massively inflated price, or Belhari...

and then usually some pathetic Pygmi Chain sword which I LOOOVE the look of and I would love to have like, 900 of those in my tanks, but the ones they sell there are like $5 for something that looks as tho its already dying or dead.

Occasionally, it'll have some Moneywort clippings (I think, as they're just labeled as Assorted plants, and I've guessing based on how it LOOKS) and everytime I've brought that home my boys FLIP for it, they LOVE that stuff... but it usually dies off before it can even start sprouting roots because its already in terrible shape when i get it. (it's already melting before it went in my tank kinda terrible shape) The first batch I bought was in good shape, but I wound up killing it along with all my other plants because that was before i knew what I was doing and the plants had essentially no nutrients at all. lol. then after that I only buy it for the boys to enjoy for the week its alive because they love it so much... no matter what i do, its basically already dead when it comes to me... I can't get a nice, full, lucious looking tank with JUST tall leafy plants. So I want this order to be worth my while and turn my tanks into underwater dense forests!


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

RussellTheShihTzu said:


> Tissue cultures are easy. The only difference is they are always disease and pest-free. You treat them the same as any other plant except you wash off the gel. I'm ordering several of Jacob's tissue cultures now listed. The other advantage is you can let them sit around and plant last.
> 
> You can also email with "wants" and if he can get them for you he will.



Huh. I thought the tissue cultures would be so much harder than that.

I might have to look into them, then... and as far as "wants".... he's basically got all the stuff I want already, I might be like, "you only have 3 of these and I really wanted 12....." but for the most part, his stock is just AMAZING and I'm super excited that I finally have money to get some.

I got a Maaaassive raise at work this week, so I'm like, "I freaking deserve to spend some money" and I'm spending it on plants lol


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I've got about $200 to spend on plants... but I know that many plants, to Alaska, even with combined shipping, is gonna be pricy. I did e-mail him with my tentative list and asked for a shipping price quote on what that would be, since how much it's going to cost is going to highly affect my order... (That order being about $220+ shipping... I'm already "over budget" but as long as it won't cost too much to send, I'll be ok lol)


----------



## JDAquatics (Jan 16, 2015)

I was looking at your list, and I would also suggest kleiner prinz sword. The ones I have now came in submersed form(kinda rare from a wholesale nursery) and have beautiful reddish leaves. They are also more suitable for smaller tanks as they dont grow as large as other swords. Also vesuvius swords, a distinctly different looking sword plant.
I would not be shy of tissue cultured plants. They are a bit pricey...but you get a lot of little plants that can be divided up to cover an area.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I miss have the Vesuvius swords... Simply because of my obsession with mount Vesuvius lol.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Should I connect my tanks to a co2 system or will the Excel be ok??


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Took a look at the other two you suggested JD, And yup. I like those!! They'll have to be added to the list...


----------



## Aqua Aurora (Oct 4, 2013)

Aside from the java moss all your plants are medium light but can go high light with co2. I can't say if your lighting is medium without more info on it including height above substrate, wats, and for LEDS specific brand and mdoel as each is different. I'll pm you some links on lighting info (from another forum) that may help (they helped me).
I don't think its wise to use both co2 and excel in the same tank. You want to balance lighting, co2, nitrogen (nitrates) and ferts. Too much co2 (using co2 + liquid co2 substitute) can cause algaes and unbalances just like having too little co2. Having so much co2+co2 supplement means you'd need very bright light, more ferts and more nitrogen to try to re-balance everything, honestly it would be better to do a higher bps (bubbles per a second-rate of co2 injected into the tank) than a low bps+excel. I've not done co2 to give personal experience but from my reading you have to pay attention to flow of tank to evenly distribute co2 and having a good diffuser so make bubbles tiny and maximize the absorption by plants before they get to the surface (there are several methods for thsi including inline diffusers for canister pipes, fine bubble making ceramic disks (common), and the fluvial starter kip bulky 'ladder' style(I think is the term?) co2 diffuser that takes a long time for the bubbles to escape so they dissolve more in the water. I'd read that its advised to turn off co2 an hour or at least 30 minutes before lights turn off for the tank, as soon as there's no light there's no photosynthesis and the co2 is not used by the plants. I think I'd also read that some people wait 30-60 minutes to start co2 after lights turn on in the 'morning' as well. Many people run air stones when lights are off to help re-oxygenat the water, you have to be careful not to 'gas' your fish (too much co2 to o2 in the tank can kill fish and inverts). 
You have a lot of stems and larger plants (swords) that may need trimmed every 7-14 days depending on environment (c02+ high light= more frequent trimming) and their growth rate to keep them in check, unless you like having stems grow out of the water, I've seen some tanks like that thought that looked pretty cool. The key thing to keep in mind is giving enough spacing between stems to let light reach the bottom leaves, if you keep them too tightly bunched or your lighting too weak the lower leaves will fall off. If you having something of a layered height of plants you can hide back stems with no bottom leaves with shorter plants in front of it. I'm sort of doing that with my 10g right now, though I have no co2, but a variety of stems at different heights.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

SO MUCH INFORMATION!!! yay!!

And oooooh... MY GOODNESS I JUST BOUGHT $125 WORTH OF STUFFFFFF yay!!!

Kleiner Prinz
Blyxa
Golden Lloyd
Rotala Nan
Baby Tears
Myrio
Red Myrio

6 of everything, (one of everything for each tank) except the Rotala... becaaaause in the 30 seconds after i added 6 to my Cart, someone bought one. And there was only 6 left.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I have SO MANY sword plants, already, that I'll easily be able to divide them up between the tanks when I re-scape everything. Decided against getting more moss, cause while I just lost a TON of it to my own stupidity, I still have a TON that takes up large portions of 2 tanks, so I can divide that too, and everyone will get a little bit and it won't block too much light


----------



## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

Ask Jacob; he may have more just not listed. If you buy direct you'll save $$ over eBay. Check his Classified.

BTW, I love my Vesuvius Swords. They look like corkscrews.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I really liked them, too. But they were a little more pricey than the rest.. not by MUCH, but, I decided to stick with more of the "bulky" plants today that I really wanted, to fill out the tanks, then see where they stand after that before I order anything else... I really wanted the fluffy bushy type plants as all my boys love playing in those the most, so stick with what I know they'll like and i'll like, then go back and get the rest of the stuff I want.

I really liked the Vesuvius, tho... and I will come back. SO. BACK. lol

And I'm actually just really happy with what i got and the fact that he has ONE price for shipping, no matter how many I bought, even to Alaska.... seriously. I was like ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? when he told me.. cause in Alaska I'm used to $12.99 Free Shipping... I haven't been this excited in foreverrr


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

My Stuff Shipped!!!! yaaay!!!


----------



## JDAquatics (Jan 16, 2015)

Ended up subbing other plants for most of the baby tears....moneywort, bacopa, and rotala macrandra. Let me know how they arrive!


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

That's FINE with me! I can buy dying baby tears here, lol. The point was to get HEALTHY plants!! I'm so excited!

Baby tears are harder to find here in Alaska, and I originally ordered some baby tears when I FIRST set up my tank with Finn... but the bag wound up getting a leak, and the water absorbed into the packing material, which made that expand, so by the time it got to me, the packing material was 2-3x the size it was, there was no cushion in the bag, and the cold air froze the insulating packing material.... because it was wet.... soooo.. I had green water and a little plastic pot... with a few floating leaves. I was very sad... it was NOT a good shipping experience, at all. I did get a refund, tho, so at least there was that.

Here in town I have a VERY limited selection, and honestly they're not healthy at all and I can only manage to nurse some of them back to life.. so right now I'm just excited that I have an actual SELECTION of plants, and that I know they're coming from a reliable source... Now I can nurse them FROM health to THRIVING!! (instead of just surviving lol)


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Seriously. I'm beyond excited. I wanted to start with live plants... I started with ONE amazon sword. lol. And the ordered Baby Tears, 2 big marimo balls and 12 itty bitty ones came in later... the baby tears showed up as soup, but the Marimo worked...

then I slowly added in more amazon swords because that was basically the only healthy looking plant we had, then I bought some non aquatic plants they love to sell as aquatic... then I found some moneywort and the boys LOOOVED it, but it died off fast cause I had no nutrients in the water for it at all. That's when it dawned on me that liquid ferts don't replace minerals, the supplement the ones that are supposed to be there... and the 5 drops of Iron/Potassium/etc was basically handing 3 peas to a starving child in africa. THen I got the Equilibrium, and better lighting, and did more research, and then started getting iffy plants that survived.. but I'm limited on what my PetCo sells... which is Java Fern, Amazon Swords, Dwarf Hairgrass, the occasional already dying moneywort, Belhari and some other random stuff here and there that I can't even identify because they're just sold as "Assorted Plants". Some are better than others, but they only keep a limited stock and its not taken care of and yeah. And the store I love so much in Anchorage is MOSTLY Saltwater, so they, too, have a limited stock of freshwater plants. I've been gunshy to order again but after hearing NOTHING but good about your products and shipping... I'm beyond giddy to try again and finally have more than 15 types of random sword plants. lol


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

My plants are "Out For Delivery"!!!! YAAAAY!!!! I can't WAIT to be off work today!!!!!!!


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

First thing I'm going to do, is a water change on Oberon, and add his plants... Then, once he's planted, I'll move on to Kismet's tank. I have to do 100% change for him, because I'm replacing his substrate with the Eco-Complete for the plants... once he's planted the rest are going, for now, into the empty 20 gallon that used to house Pandora and Laz. I did an 80% change of water yesterday with a large amount of cleaning, then I'll change another 80% today, and turn those filters back on and get that tank going. Then on Sunday, after the other 20 gallon has been vacant and off for over 48 to kill the columnaris (as well as what will be 3 water changes by then) everything in there will be rinsed and cleaned up, and then some of those massive amounts of sword plants will go to the other 20 gallon, and some of the new plants from the other 20 gallon will go into the other one, and then i'll have both 20 gallons up and running again, one of them waiting on a fish-less cycle, and hopefully Finn's tank won't have lost his cycle, but he's waiting a few more days to go home just as a precaution anyways. Then he goes home, and hopefully, everything will go back to "normal"


----------



## ApochSaint (Apr 19, 2015)

so if youre trying to carpet the baby tears its not gonna work out for you. If you just want them to grow upwards you should be fine. Baby tears to carpet need some pretty serious light and a CO2 setup


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

No carpeting... All upwards! :-D

Plants made it and an initial rummage thru they look great! I'm so excited!


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

OMGGGG...... My jaw hurts cause I've been clenching my jaw and it hurts to eat and I can't eat my dinner fast enough to start cleaning tanks!!!!! *eats as quickly as possible)


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Food is ate! Plants time!!!


----------



## KellyC (Feb 28, 2014)

Watermelon...I am also in Canada andi found someone on kijiji who 
Ives n my city that sells plants. Check out your local kijiji as you might find someone that way. It's usually cheaper too. I will be changing my tank to a planted tank soon.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

EEEEEEE!!!!!

Oberon's tank is SO FULL OF PLANTS!!!! He LOVES it!!

Kept Kismet's a little more sparse for now, since he went from silk plants to real plants, I want him to have a bit of adjustment time... But there's still SO MUCH IN THERE...


AND I STILL HAVE SO MANY MORE PLANTS!!!!!!They're "planted" in a tank, but not arranged... I got tired and my ribs hurt so I had to give up for the night but wow so many pretty plants!!!


----------



## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

Gorgeous! I'll bet your boys are happy, happy.  Am so glad you found a plant source who will mail to Alaska and not charge you as much for shipping as for the plants.

I'll be doing the same thing when I get my humongous order.

Keep us posted with photos.


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Yeah.. when I emailed and asked what it would be to ship up here with a super large order, he goes, "My shipping is flat rate, no matter how many you get." and I'm like, Even to Alaksa...???? 

And then I just started sobbing lol.

And he thru in several extras!!! I'm so stinkin giddy, its ridiculous. Oberon hasn't been this happy, ever!! His tank was always a little bare looking, even tho he had 4 Belhari... but those are so TALL so he leaves at the top and nothing at the bottom.. now he's like, "I don't even know what to do with myself in here..."

And Kismet is still like, "These.... are not the silk plants I had before... and what the heck is this giant thing in the middle of my tank....???" But he's already "Uprooted" several stems swimming in and out of everything... SUCH a happy boy.


----------



## Tree (Sep 29, 2013)

EEEEP! They have arrived and they look Awesome in the tanks! =D


----------



## InStitches (May 26, 2014)

looking great! And wow so many plants!!!!


----------



## ApochSaint (Apr 19, 2015)

I must say.....super jelly of that driftwood piece


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Yeah. Had NO intentions of buying driftwood when I got that piece.... But it was too good to leave behind. It was Pandora's wood, but it's Kismet's Now!


----------



## Innerbeauty (Jul 31, 2014)

Beautiful! I'm so glad you were able to get it shipped like that!
I love the layout, it is gorgeous. Now let's see how many times you change it


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Innerbeauty said:


> Beautiful! I'm so glad you were able to get it shipped like that!
> I love the layout, it is gorgeous. Now let's see how many times you change it



LOL!! Once I have the plants in a decent arrangement, I don't tend to change it often. Right now the biggest problem I had arranging the tanks is that I'm unfamiliar with most of the plants and how they looked IN the water.... so I just kinda... splattered them about a bit lol. Oberon's tank is so "messy" with the layout and i'm totally loving the look lol


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Yay! It's not empty anymore!


----------



## BettaLover898998 (Jul 10, 2015)

don't forget the banana plant thing


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

I don't have a banana plant... I don't think I like them... never seen in person but all the pictures look silly lol


----------



## Innerbeauty (Jul 31, 2014)

In person the banana plant leaves are gorgeous!  Don't knock my banana plant 

I love that layout!! The driftwood is awesome!!!


----------



## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

Innerbeauty said:


> In person the banana plant leaves are gorgeous!  Don't knock my banana plant
> 
> I love that layout!! The driftwood is awesome!!!


Agreed! I love Banana Plants; they are much nicer in person than photos could show. You should get one and plant it in the back until it does its thing. ;-)


----------



## ApochSaint (Apr 19, 2015)

what is teh broad green and red leaf plant on the left of your tank and what is the fluffy red one on the right? i want to get those


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Kleiner Prinz: http://www.ebay.com/itm/kleiner-prinz-small-live-aquarium-plant-/111730708180

and the other was Red Myrio


----------



## InStitches (May 26, 2014)

...I really like the Kleiner Prinz, I may have too get one, too!


----------



## FinnDublynn (Feb 27, 2015)

Yeah.. I didn't care for the photo TOO much, honestly, originally. So I skipped over it when I did my shopping, but JD suggested it, and I took a better look and i was like, Oh, that's actually kinda nice. And I thought it was looked WAAAY smaller in the pictures... so these plants come in and i'm like Dayum..... These are awesome....

I want more. lol


----------

