Averagr length of times your plants live

[Sarlindescent]

Sooooo....I have been doing aquariums and planted tanks for a few years now. For me, it's been a huge learning curve. The plants, barring a few, were relatively easy. The scapes..... My first tank I wanted to do a forest. I had 2 pieces of spiderwood, one on each side. It looked pretty cool. The only problem is I couldn't actually fit my hands in the tank. 90% of all maintenance had to be done with tweezers....Screw that. That tank came down and I got a CO2 rig and tried some hard plants. Completely my mistakes, but my water wasn't compatible with the plants I tried. Aquasoil only does so much when you have liquid rock and soft water plants.

Moving on, I started a spec III betta tank and that went awesome for a year or so. The betta passed, he was pretty big when I got him. So I decided to change it up. At that time, I changed my favorite planted tank to a reef and started watching more scaping video. Then I started growing out fish from big box pet stores (honestly my biggest mistake) and plants went in a holding tank. Now I am setting up 3 new planted tanks over this year.

I love my planted tanks, and expect I will always have at least one, but learning when I like, want, and can maintain has been a huge plus. If I could start from scratch knowing what I know now, I suspect I still would change tanks periodically, but would have 1-2 long term tanks. With that said, even as much internet as I consume, many of these lessons are best learned through experience.

My advice for anyone new:
start easy
think about long term maintenance
consider tap water parameters before deciding on plants/fish
determine how much time you have for maintenance
Get what you want from the start
Learn how plants will grow (This can greatly effect long term scape and maintenance)
Buy more crypts (favorite plant)
Buy a python (for a planted scaped tank, algae is the killer and maintenance is key)
If you add liquid ferts, add a cheap dosing pump
Consistency is key

 

[Sarlindescent]

Sooooo....I have been doing aquariums and planted tanks for a few years now. For me, it's been a huge learning curve. The plants, barring a few, were relatively easy. The scapes..... My first tank I wanted to do a forest. I had 2 pieces of spiderwood, one on each side. It looked pretty cool. The only problem is I couldn't actually fit my hands in the tank. 90% of all maintenance had to be done with tweezers....Screw that. That tank came down and I got a CO2 rig and tried some hard plants. Completely my mistakes, but my water wasn't compatible with the plants I tried. Aquasoil only does so much when you have liquid rock and soft water plants.

Moving on, I started a spec III betta tank and that went awesome for a year or so. The betta passed, he was pretty big when I got him. So I decided to change it up. At that time, I changed my favorite planted tank to a reef and started watching more scaping video. Then I started growing out fish from big box pet stores (honestly my biggest mistake) and plants went in a holding tank. Now I am setting up 3 new planted tanks over this year.

I love my planted tanks, and expect I will always have at least one, but learning when I like, want, and can maintain has been a huge plus. If I could start from scratch knowing what I know now, I suspect I still would change tanks periodically, but would have 1-2 long term tanks. With that said, even as much internet as I consume, many of these lessons are best learned through experience.

My advice for anyone new:
start easy
think about long term maintenance
consider tap water parameters before deciding on plants/fish
determine how much time you have for maintenance
Get what you want from the start
Learn how plants will grow (This can greatly effect long term scape and maintenance)
Buy more crypts (favorite plant)
Buy a python (for a planted scaped tank, algae is the killer and maintenance is key)
If you add liquid ferts, add a cheap dosing pump
Consistency is key

 

[HarleyK]

I set up and planted my 220 gal in 2007. My plants have been the same since.

I notice that different plants do better at different times, with different bioloads, which is to be expected. But the same species are still around that I introduced originally. Some of the same actual plants are, too (Echinodorus, Crinum)

 

[magpie]

In my experience, when first setting up a tank, until you figure out which plants thrive best, there can be some tossing/purchasing. But I do low tech, and prefer lower maintenance, so don't want to add a bunch of specified ferts to the water all the time. (I do a weekly Flourish dose and root tabs every now and then.)

But once you figure out what works and get a routine set up, you shouldn't have to replace many unless again you just want a change. I've definitely had plants live for 5 years. (Maybe with things like vals that reproduce all the time they weren't necessarily the original plant but I never needed to buy new vals after they got established.)

For me I tend to pull out / trim excess plants every week (vs. buy new) and that's the way I prefer it.