How many plants to start out with?

Hey guys,

I've just set up 2 tanks, a 10 gallon dirtied and a 45 gallon with sand. How many plants should I put in at once? My tanks have been running with a filter on for a few days so they should be clean. I've heard to only put in a few plants at a time and then I've hear to plant the hell out of my tank.

Thanks.

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Permalink Reply by Francisco M on August 7, 2012 at 10:34pm

I have a 20gl with dirt. I started off with 5, they survived and are still around and strong. Then I added a bunch, the only plants that didn't survive on that bunch was Water Sprite and Rotala. I notice that out of all the bunch these two had almost no roots, just very small thin ones. It's been 3 months now and I've started buying these plants again, for example I just bought a Wisteria, it's rooting good even though when I bought them they had almost nothing. I'm still a noob at this stuff, but if I were you, I would start off with plants that have strong roots. As for how many you should start off, I honestly cant answer that. The only reason I started off with 5 was because I was low on money and 5 was how much I could afford lol Good luck!

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Permalink Reply by Keith Mc-Fish on August 7, 2012 at 11:07pm

yes I hear you about the money, just wondering did you buy online or at a LFS?

Thanks!

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Permalink Reply by Francisco M on August 8, 2012 at 1:31am

Both actually. The first 5 were bought on a Local Pet Store, they all had strong roots. Then the bunch I got were bought online on AquaticJungles. Other than the two plants with the small thin roots that died, the rest from this bunch are now giving me runners and growing healthy strong. Also, like Breezer mentioned, get duckweed. When I got the bunch, I also got a handful of Duckweed from AquaticJungles. :)

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Permalink Reply by Peter on August 7, 2012 at 11:00pm

Get as many as u Can but remember the plants grow n reproduce so after a while u will have more plants then u will know what to do with

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Permalink Reply by Keith Mc-Fish on August 7, 2012 at 11:07pm

I hope to get there one day! :)

Thanks so much!

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Permalink Reply by Breezer on August 7, 2012 at 11:21pm

i say plant the shit out of it. or plant it moderately and put duckweed on top to absorb excess nutrients. like said before start with easy plants that have lots of roots (swords, cripts, val, dwarf sag). the many roots will help absorb the excess nutrients the dirt creates.

i planted the crap out of my 10gal after dirting. now i have kind of a problem cause my plants are doing so well and growing so much but theres almost no where for them to go and i dont have another tank to transfer all the runners or new baby plants.

if you have another tank to put the runners and babies of your tank then plant it heavily

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Permalink Reply by Keith Mc-Fish on August 8, 2012 at 2:18am

Thank you so much, the only thing is, is i don't think my LFS has duck weed :(

and I have another question about dirt.

Can you put like dirt from your back yard or does it have to be the organic in the bag?

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Permalink Reply by Peter on August 8, 2012 at 3:17am

Yes u can put dirt from ur back yard so long some1 didn't add plant fertilizer at some point ( the non organic chem fertilizer) but what u want to do is swift it so u only get te dirt and u remove the bugs n stuff then bake it for like 15 min to kill n e micro hitch hikers and ur good

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Permalink Reply by Keith Mc-Fish on August 8, 2012 at 11:40pm

Sounds great!

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Permalink Reply by Keith Mc-Fish on August 8, 2012 at 11:41pm

wow I may sounds dumb and immature but I never would have thought 55 people would have viewed my post!!! :D

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Permalink Reply by Mr Puffer on August 12, 2012 at 2:04pm

Only add a few at a time if you are low on money. There really is no point in adding only a few plants at a time. Plants don't put a bioload on the aquarium like fish do, in fact they do the exact opposite and filter the tank.