# changed tank to plants



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

Hi, if anyone was watching my other thread, then you will know I was thinking of a NPT, but with my dilemma about what type of soil to buy, I decided I would try planting the tank up just using the current glass gravel and adding two seachem's flourish tabs. I have also change the light to a 6500k output light. I shall be keeping a close eye on the water parameters, hopefully it will all grow ok. below are some pictures before with the silk plants and now with the real plants, only time will tell how well it will all go.


----------



## Chachi (Sep 22, 2013)

I love it! I'm sure your fish will too!


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

Chachi said:


> I love it! I'm sure your fish will too!


 thanks, did a water check this morning and all reading normal so far. My guy is really inspecting the plant life for food items, who knows maybe he has found and ate the odd living thing, I didn't notice anything, but some of the plants came out of tanks containing other live stock. :-D


----------



## helms97 (Sep 21, 2011)

that looks great! do you by any chance know the name of the plant in the front left? i love it!


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

helms97 said:


> that looks great! do you by any chance know the name of the plant in the front left? i love it!


No I don't, but I will need to go back to the pet shop soon to get some more frozen food, I will go and have a look at the name for you. I will either pm you or post back on this thread.


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

Checked the water parameters today all reading fine still.


----------



## caltha (Sep 11, 2013)

absolutely beautiful. how hard was it to make the transition from fake plants to live ones?


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

caltha said:


> absolutely beautiful. how hard was it to make the transition from fake plants to live ones?


It was quite easy, I have been battling algae blooms for a while on my silk plants, despite doing 50% water changes every week, and having a really low output bulb in the tank, which was only on in the evenings. I still would get patches of algae on some of the silk plants and even with taking out and scrubbing clean, it would be there again in a few weeks time. It wasn't really bad, but with Betta's even that can cause a infection for them, they need super clean. So once decided and after research I decided to get some plants and plant tabs. I also changed to a higher bulb for the plants. I took all the silk plants out and arranged the live ones, (most have roots shooting) I did have to break down the bunches though, separating some of the plants into two because they were too big. In hindsight I could have bought one less plant, but it is early days and they might all not thrive anyway, although I did ask in the shop what grows fairly fast and this lot was recommended, so we shall see. lol

The most worrying thing for me is an ammonia peak due to dying vegetation from any of the plants that are not doing so well. My filter is mature so hopefully it will deal with it ok, but at the moment I am checking the water daily for ammonia.


----------



## snowflake311 (Jun 19, 2013)

I don't think your award plant will make it. They are heavy root feeding plants and that green is not good for plants that need to feed with their roots. 

A few of the other might be ok because they will take from the water. You might want to look into a plant substrate. 

It does look great.


----------



## caltha (Sep 11, 2013)

beautiful Betta said:


> It was quite easy, I have been battling algae blooms for a while on my silk plants, despite doing 50% water changes every week, and having a really low output bulb in the tank, which was only on in the evenings. I still would get patches of algae on some of the silk plants and even with taking out and scrubbing clean, it would be there again in a few weeks time. It wasn't really bad, but with Betta's even that can cause a infection for them, they need super clean. So once decided and after research I decided to get some plants and plant tabs. I also changed to a higher bulb for the plants. I took all the silk plants out and arranged the live ones, (most have roots shooting) I did have to break down the bunches though, separating some of the plants into two because they were too big. In hindsight I could have bought one less plant, but it is early days and they might all not thrive anyway, although I did ask in the shop what grows fairly fast and this lot was recommended, so we shall see. lol
> 
> The most worrying thing for me is an ammonia peak due to dying vegetation from any of the plants that are not doing so well. My filter is mature so hopefully it will deal with it ok, but at the moment I am checking the water daily for ammonia.


did you have to buy any special plant gravel or anything of that sort? or you just stuck it right into the gravel you already had? i'm really interested in switching to live plants, but i'm afraid it might be too much maintenance. do you have to buy plant food that i see at petsmart and such or they just thrive off proper lighting?


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

snowflake311 said:


> I don't think your award plant will make it. They are heavy root feeding plants and that green is not good for plants that need to feed with their roots.
> 
> A few of the other might be ok because they will take from the water. You might want to look into a plant substrate.
> 
> It does look great.


thanks, I don't know what you mean by that green is not good for plants? I did add two seachems flourish plant tabs into the glass gravel.


----------



## snowflake311 (Jun 19, 2013)

beautiful Betta said:


> thanks, I don't know what you mean by that green is not good for plants? I did add two seachems flourish plant tabs into the glass gravel.


The green glass. 

The root tabs help best if the substrate holds in the nurients. Root tabs are great for Sword plants. You need to keep using them every 3-6 months. I need to find more for my sword plant.


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

snowflake311 said:


> The green glass.
> 
> The root tabs help best if the substrate holds in the nurients. Root tabs are great for Sword plants. You need to keep using them every 3-6 months. I need to find more for my sword plant.


ah thanks, I actually thought out of all the plants that one looked better. The shop I got them from wouldn't have done anything special for them and they were in a gravel substrate, but I know what you mean about the glass substrate. I shall have to see how they go


----------



## helms97 (Sep 21, 2011)

beautiful Betta said:


> No I don't, but I will need to go back to the pet shop soon to get some more frozen food, I will go and have a look at the name for you. I will either pm you or post back on this thread.


great, thank you very much!


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

caltha said:


> did you have to buy any special plant gravel or anything of that sort? or you just stuck it right into the gravel you already had? i'm really interested in switching to live plants, but i'm afraid it might be too much maintenance. do you have to buy plant food that i see at petsmart and such or they just thrive off proper lighting?


hi caltha, I didn't notice your thread earlier, otherwise I would have commented earlier. Anyway, no I didn't do anything in particular the glass gravel is what I already had in the tank, although wether it will be sufficient enough I don't know. I did add into the gravel some seachems flourish tabs, which I bought from my local pet store, you can get them in the states, but see picture below to know what box to look for. the only other thing I did was change the light bulb to a more powerful one. It is early days so it might all die, but I will keep everyone posted on it's progress or lack off, lol.

and what the tabs look like.


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

okay so my new plants have been in less than a week so far, already some of the plants are coming out the water.

If anyone can advise how to trim it that would be great, at the moment I am thinking to cut the stem just before the leaves?
and this other plant as actually grown a whole new leaf that wasn't there when the plant when in, its the one in the very centre, its quite big now.

Plant before.

Plant now, new leaf very centre.

:lol::lol:


----------



## beautiful Betta (Sep 19, 2013)

helms97 said:


> that looks great! do you by any chance know the name of the plant in the front left? i love it!


Hi, I have been back to the pet shop, and the plant was listed as Curly Ivy.

A update all the plants seem to be doing ok, there is a few bits of die back, but those bits were already looking to be on the turn to no return when I put the plants in. The other good thing is that no algae grows on the plants, and the tank seems to have stayed algae free despite the higher powered light. I am due to do a water change tomorrow.:-D


----------

