What is required to maintain a 30 gallon planted aquarium?
by Aquaboy on Monday, January 25th, 2010 | 2 Comments
What does it take to maintain a 30 gallon planted aquarium? I don’t want too many plants just a few here and there. Do the plants just need a lot of light and nutrients? Is Flourite Plant Substrate good to use?
i have a planted tank and i dont use any plant food stuff, i think it just helps but you dont need and as far as light goes, i just turn the light on in the morning and off at night, and both my fish and plants are healthy! hope i helped!
I’ve used flourite before, its pretty good, but it really only supplies some macro nutrients (like iron) and some micro nutrients. Just think of the substrate itself as a fertilizer supplement. As far as light… yes they do need it. You need some sort of fluorescent fixture, whether it be just Standard fluorescent tubing (High Output or Very High Output which is what most standard light hoods come with) compact fluorescent (perfect for your tank size) or T-5 (also good). The bulbs need to be anything from 6200-10,000 k temp for the plants to actually benefit from the light. If you decide to keep the hood that came with your tank that just has the one bulb in there, you can use it, just get a bulb made for plants. You can do one of those 50/50 light options too, that make the water look crisp and bright. Just remember with light to try to keep the watts per gallons at about 2-3. Basically any bulb 60 watts or greater will be great for it. If you decide to have more than just a few plants you may have to add co2, but I wouldn’t worry about that now. You will need to fertilize here and there if you want your plants to grow and look their best. Anything sea-chem makes will be ok for what it sounds like you want to do. Have fun. Its a lot to throw at ya i know, but its a venture worth doing. You’ll love plants!