Questions about live plants w/pics

As mentioned in the "Accurate Freshwater Test Kit" thread, I have some live plants.

I was wondering if anyone could help me ID them. I also have some questions regarding care.

This is my 18gal. The large plant is of course, the live one. It's producing new, healthy growth, so much so I took one of the stalks, and buried the end (the leaves at the end were growing 3in long roots) in the gavel. I intend to prune it soon and transplant it to the 55gal tank (unless there is a reason(s) I shouldn't). But as you can see, the older leaves have black spots on them. Is that bad? Sure, it doesn't look good. But is it bad? Should I remove them? What say ye?



This is the 55gal (still have quite few plants to add, but haven't purchased them yet). The live plants are the two sets in the middle on either side of the rock cave. There is also a live fern (forgot to mention it last night) to the right in the pic. Looks kinda ratty IMHO, but it was a real mother to anchor). Anyone know what these 3 are? So far I've been using "Flourish Tabs" in both tanks (only one in the 18 and I've got 2 in the 55).

Any opinions on care for all of these plants? Anything I need to be concerned about? Anything I'm doing wrong so far?

 

I'm by no means a plant expert. I do have a planted tank, but I've just managed to stumble along w/o doing too much special for the plants (all I've done is add extra light).

Anyway, the first plant looks like like some kind of sword plant (not an amazon sword, though). I think most swords tend to be fairly hardy so I don't really see a problem with transplanting it or pruning off any dead leaves (you actually do want to get rid of the dead leaves or they'll rot & increase your nitrAte).

I'm not entirely sure about the black spots. Could be some kind of nutrient deficiency. Your Flourish Tabs might help.

In the 55, the tall, leggy plants are anacharis. I actually just recently added some to my tank. They're supposed to be pretty hardy and good for eating up nitrAtes and providing oxygen.

I cant really tell what the fern type plant is. I'm thinking maybe a wisteria, but I could be wrong.

-Chelle

 

Well, ya know, it gives me a good place to start researching. Thank you very much for the info.

 

I believe the first plant is an Amazon Sword (Echinodorus Bleheri). I could be wrong and it might be a Brazilian Sword (Spathiphyllum - Peace Lily). Here is a website where you can take a look and see what looks closest to your plant.
www.aquaticplantdepot.com/

 

I am also not a great plant expert, But have a lot of plants in my massive tetra aquarium. We call plants, different names though not the real ones, We refer the 1st one as banana plant. The second one seems to be a kabamba. But not very sure about their biological names. Will let you know that from my plants expert.

By the look of the plants, They seem to not last for more than a month from now. And majorly lack nutrition. Plants if turns black means that they are rotten. Tough might not affect fishes immediately, But will derate the water quality quickly.

Note that to grow plants in an aquarium, I consulted an expert and have a lot of other setup to have apart from the ones you have.

One should be using plant fretiliser, A CO2 cylinder, A dispenser, A mixer, Needle controller for adequately providing suffitient amount of Co2 to the tank. Also should have adequate day light,
We have these day light Tubelights also as a replacements which i use if we have in-suffitient day light for the plants.

I have a layer of fertilisers mixed with clay soil at the bottom of tank. Also one should have shell free gravel, as shells do hinder plants growth above the fertiliser and clay soil mix.

I took nearly 15 days to fill in the tank with water where in i used a droplet method to fill the water for the 1st time. After doing this had to wait for my tank to cycle, Checked the parameters regularly before introducing fishes into it.

Even the water clean / change process have to be pretty slow and should be carefully done with this setup. Filter's water pressure should also be controller if we are looking at this setup.
Note that once the plants are in place one cannot add remove the plants as this will bring up the clay and the fertiliser messing the water quality.


I have this setup since an year and the plants are great and healthy. And are lovely to watch. They are compleatly green in colour. Will try to post those pictures in my next post.

But with this setup, One might have to be changing the plants and its setup every month to keep the water parameters clean.

Which i used to do before having this setup.

 

I was kind of thinking brazillian sword too, but I wasn't sure. I definitely don't think it's an amazon sword, though, because the leaves are too broad.

-Chelle

 

Wow, that seems a bit drastic, frankly. The plant in the 18gal (The Brazilian Sword we think it is) is producing plenty of new growth that is healthy. And its growing quite rapidy. There is one stalk (straight in front of the black and yellow guppy in the pic above) that was under water yesterday, as you can see in the pic. Today it's almost an inch out of the water. It's growing like mad, and you dont think it'll last a month?

I've provided my plants with the aforementioned Flourish Tabs (dunno if they're crap or not because I'm just getting started in this area).

I'm no plant expert, but its actions seem contrary to this belief. I just pruned off the bad leaves (a total of 4).

Maybe I misread what you said, but it seems from everything I read at Steve Hampton's site goes against this grain. The 3 plants that I have across 2 aquariums shouldn't require all that according to his site. (A site that was highly recommended on this board).

I'm gonna play it day by day and see how it goes. I have no desire to get involved in a bunch of equipment and other work just to make a single plant live, that should be doing just fine under the circumstances.

If I misread anything you said, I deeply apologize. I'm trying to learn as much as possible, from those of you who know waaay more than I do (which admittedly isn't much in regards to all this). But If I did read you right, I just can't accept that that plant will be dead in a month. It's already survived longer than that, and its doing well except for the older leaves (which are now gone).

Please correct me if I'm wrong. I'm not opposed to being wrong. Gotta learn somehow right?

Thanks for everyone's responses. Slowly but surely we'll get it all figured out.

 

Hi HazeX,
Yehhh!!! Its worthless investing so much for just a few plants.

On the life of the plant, on my comments what i ment was that it might look OK at this point of time, But the state of the leaves which look good today might not be the same in another 2-3 weeks is what i ment, And the plant dies slowly.

Also many a times in my setup similar to this earlier the leaves that got rotten got stuck inside my filter, Making my filter media dirty quickly.

 

Ahhh I see. Well, I'm gonna make sure any "crap leaves" stay outta the tank, unless of course that means the whole thing gets pruned and it has no leaves. lolol But with as much new growth its producing, I dont think I'll have a problem there. And thats good news.

I think I'll take t_chelles advice and get some Java Fern for the big tank and see how it turns out.

The rainbow sharks are feasting on the kabamba or whatever it is you called it. lol I just hope they leave some for decoration. lol

 

The live plants in the 55 gallon are Anachris. Cobamba has much finer leaves like the pale blue plant in the picture just to the right of the Anachris.

 

Check this out for basics of a planted tank and its maintanance http://www.vectrapoint.com/main/manual/bms1.html

-Raghu

 

Cool! Thanks!

After a little research, it turns out that sword above, is an Argentine Sword. And I'm happy to say that after a bit of trimming last week, it is in much better health than it appears above. Lots and lots of new growth (quite rapid growth at that). Even transplanted part of it to the 55gal tank. All is well. Even gave my male guppies a couple girls to run around with. hehe

http://www.australianrainbowfish.com/aq ... sis_01.htm