Thinking about starting a 5 gal planted tank

[harpospeaking]

Hi everyone,

I'm new here, and I'm here because I'm thinking about starting a 5 gallon planted tank. I tried before with a 10 gallon tank and got fed up with all the algae. If you can give me some advice on getting started, I'd really appreciate it so I can make an informed decision about this project.

Here's what I'm hoping for:

slow-growing plants
no need to add CO2 manually
pretty much low-maintenance - once a week trimming
not too expensive


Here's the infromation I need to know:

what species of plants should I choose?
what amount of lighting would be sufficient?
how can i avoid growing algae?
what fish (and more important, how many) can I house?
what non-fish alernatives can I add (not with the fish, it's either fish or something that's not a fish living in there)?
any recommended manufacturers of tanks?
is this all worth it?

Thanks,
Audrey

[trenac]

Slow growing low light plants: Anubias, Crypts, Java fern.

Fish for a 5G tank: Betta, Endlers, Dwarf puffer, Dwarf corys, Guppy.

Non- fish: Shrimps

Brands of tank: Eclipse or Mini-bow

The above brands of tank should have enough light to provide for low light plants. I think the Eclipse 6 would be the better choice. To help keep algae at bay you need to have a balanced tanked, the smaller the tank the harder it is to keep in balance. Also I would suggest some fast growing plants for the first few months to help keep algae at bay; you may want to keep some Hornwort at all times to help suck up nutrients.

Here are some helpful links... http://www.aquariaplants.com/lowlighttank.htm
http://www.aquahobby.org/articles/e_plant.php
http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_newtank.htm