Hi everyone! New to this forum, but already have learned a ton! I recently set up a tank in my office. Unfortunately, I set it up before deciding that I wanted to go with a planted tank! Having done a ton of reading on this forum, knowing what I know now, I would have obviously done a few things differently, but too late for that now!
Here is what I have going on:
Plants:
Stock:
Here is what I have going on:
- 5 gallon minibow
- Stock filter
- 50watt heater set to around 82 degrees (slightly high, am battling ick at the moment)
- Regular old gravel, no substrate
- 10 watt 5100k fluorescent light, set on a 12 hour timer. (7am on, 7pm off)
Plants:
dwarf anubia (Do I have it buried properly? Is the rhizome too far in the gravel?)
- anachris/elodea (although I don't really like it, it keeps falling apart and making a mess in the tank
- wisteria
- some other grass looking plant I bought at Petco when I first set up the tank, don't know what it is!
Stock:
- 1 balloon belly molly
- 7 balloon belly molly fry (I assume I'll need to get rid of some of these as they grow bigger?)
- 1 lyretail molly
- 1 fancytail guppy
- 2 ghost shrimp
I would like to have a heavily planted tank, similar to this. I read through the thread and it looks like this guy is dosing Flourish pretty heavily, but other than that, has nothing else I don't have. No substrate, no extra lighting, etc.
Could I accomplish the same in my tank? What fertilizers should I get? Dosing? What additional plants should I look into? I assume I should get a test kit to test the water weekly? I am also thinking about buying a piece of driftwood for the tank. So many questions and so much to learn! I would love to hear your suggestions on what I can achieve with this setup!
Here are a few pics of my tank now, apologies for the crappy cell phone pics.