[shrimp? fish? CRABS?!?]

This Journey into this hobby has brought me far, and quick, now I'm trying to learn, and get better as fast a possible, how good is that for me? I don't know. I have a much larger tank in the works, but for the short term, I'm working on a Low-Tech, planted 40-gallon rimless aquarium that will be home to four angelfish, and a pod of cory cats(Yes I know, it's stocked quite heavily). So my plan is to get a fully planted tank up and running with a HOB filter, Doses of liquid ferts after every water change, and root tabs every couple of months or so, with aqua soil as a base substrate and decorative sand as the top substrate. I'm going to run generic high-power lights off Amazon(I'm seeing that many people have success growing plants with these lights).

Here are my questions:

How many are too many plants?

Where can I get plants that have a low risk of pests?

How long do I have to wait for a tank to do a no-fish-cycle if I dose ammonia frequently? As I'm trying to move these fish into this tank as soon as possible(Their current home is less than ideal).

Any Advice Will Be Appreciated!

 

[Plinkploop]

Too many plants only really happens, to me, when they start killing each other, but it also depends on the habitat you are setting up.

Best chance at not getting pests would be with a reputable tissue culture source, though it's not 100% I'd say it's around 95% and certainly safer than any other way.

Last question I cannot answer as I don't use ammonia dosing for fishless cycles.

Hope that helps a little, even though it is kind of personal opinion.

 

[shrimp? fish? CRABS?!?]

Too many plants only really happens, to me, when they start killing each other, but it also depends on the habitat you are setting up.

Best chance at not getting pests would be with a reputable tissue culture source, though it's not 100% I'd say it's around 95% and certainly safer than any other way.

Last question I cannot answer as I don't use ammonia dosing for fishless cycles.

Hope that helps a little, even though it is kind of personal opinion.

So how would you cycle a tank other than that, fish food?

 

[Plinkploop]

I use a table shrimp lol like the kind you cook and eat. I put it in a mesh bag for easy removal. Feeding the tank fish food works too. Both the shrimp and the food methods are much messier and I most likely wouldn't use the shrimp method if I had started the hobby now but old habits die hard 😂 the ammonia method would be my recommendation, I just don't know if there's any tricks to it where adding more frequently would help due to lack of experience.

 

[Griznatch]

Some people use fish food to generate ammonia. I use lots of plants some snails and a guppy or two along with a seasoned sponge from a currently running tank.

 

[Leeatl]

I don't think there is a difference in time no mater how you cycle unless you use one of the bacteria in a bottle to help . The fastest way to help speed up the process is to get some established filter media from another of your tanks or a friends , LFS , or such . Here is an ammonia calculator to help if you go that route.... Calculator (fishforums.net) . You can get the pure ammonia at ACE Hardware .