Bichir and planted tanks

[HybridHerp]

Anyone here keeping their bichir with plants? I don't have any good recent pictures, seeing as I have a scary amount of BBA and disrepair due to the aftermath of the hurricane screwing with my tank, but I've been keeping my endli and senegal with swords, hygro, various crypts, red tiger lotus, crinum, bannana plant, lace plants, and limnophia aromatica, with more plants to come and loads more stem plants and moss.

anyone else doing anything like this? I've got to say that my bichirs seem to like the live plants more than they did the fake plants, and it gives them more hiding spaces and I guess makes them more comfortable.

 

[Burbotman]

Plants and poly's are a great comination! A year ago, JamesF inspired me to get into plants and I have not looked back. Now saying that, it is really each to their own and personal preference.
Look at some of the bare style tanks like Hao's and see how great his fish are doing and it is apparent that feeding, and water quality are more important than decor.

I like the planted look as it keeps me from seeing how horribly overstocked I really am . Lets see some pics of your tank.

 

[Burbotman]

This before pic illustrates the appeal of plants for me personally.

 

[HybridHerp]

^How big is the biggest bichir in that tank, and is that tank a 75?

and I will get pics of my tank in a few days (though seriously, it sucks right now....its been with my parents and Sandy struck so it'll probably be in disarray)

what plants do you have in there, particularly the foreground. It looks pretty cool
Myself, I just want to get some epic ludwigias and swords in my tank, along with other super fancy plants. Hopefully by the springtime my tank will be amazing as hell lol

 

[Burbotman]

Tank is 160g (custom made 58"X26"X26") Biggest bichir now is The Weeksii or Congicus both 22-22.5". (Lost my old 23" Ornate this past summer). Endi and Lap pushing 20", round out the mix are another lap, couple of dels,ansorgii/endi cross, Bullhead catfish, florida gar, small sen and little ornate in the growout.
Plant wise, swords and jungle vals in the foreground, anubius, java fern, java moss, wisteria and a corkscrew val around back and sides.-----Debating about really commiting to the planted tank and swapping the PFS for black flourite sand.

The plants are enjoyable for they provide another avenue for "tinkering" with the tank. (helps keep me from adding fish as well-now just add a plant to fill the void)

 

[lix.ma14]

it's a good idea.

 

[HybridHerp]

you wouldn't need to swap the substrates to really commit I feel

I'd just get root tabs to give the plants extra fertilization. You can't really do more than that without going super hi-tech, which I doub't you'd want to do cause I feel hi-tech works the best when you plant on starting a tank as hi-tech (such as starting with the lights and co2 and the nutrient rich substrate).

If anything, try and look up other plants that do well in low tech situations. I can tell you off hand that any hygrophilia species (temple plant) and crypt species would work great in this kind of tank. Java moss works incredibly well, covering whatever you want it to, and you could always try different types of swords and different varieties of java fern and diffeerent anubias species as well.