My South American Bio-Tope Plans,

[AquaAlex1993]

I am currently planning out a 6' South American/Amazonian Bio-Tope aquarium. It is going to be a semi-aggressive community aquarium with some interesting and gorgeous specimens from South America. I will discuss my planned stock in a bit.
I would like your input on some of the things I am interested in doing.
A friend of mine suggested that I use Pothos Plants in my filter to get rid of nitrates. He said simply place the roots into the HOB filter.My question is can I put the plants on top of my aquarium and put the roots in the aquarium water? Do these plants really remove nitrates?
As for decorating the tank, I'm going for a more natural look. I am going to do black sand and driftwood (plenty of driftwood) and plastic plants and I am considering real plants as well. Some real plants I am thinking about are java fern, Anubias, Amazon Sword, and more! My question is I will be having Myleus silverdollars in the aquarium, which plants would be recommended for a tank with Silverdollars?
Here is my planned stocklist:
4 Redhook silverdollars, 3 to 4 Black Bar Silverdollars
3 to 4 Red or Yellow Tail Barracuda
1 Flagtail Proch.
Chocolate cichlid
Severum Cichlid
Wild Caught Scalare Angelfish or Tony Tan F2 Altum Angelfish or Leopaldi
L200 PLECO
L600 or L114 pleco
Blue Phantom pleco
L129 pleco
L201 pleco
Vampire Pleco
Lima Shovelnose
Black Ghost Knife
I will have a canister filter, multiple HOB filters, and a decent light.
Water changes will be done 2 to 3 times a week. What is your input?

 

[jhook]

That seems to be quite a bit of fish, but it sounds awesome!
Yes, pothos does use the nitrates to grow and quickly. I use it in the sump of my 150g and it helps, especially with my 2 Oscars that believe that they are really swimming pigs. I just stuck the roots and a bit of the stem in the water and it has been growing and helping clean my water for about a year now.
Read up on the sticky in the filtration section, I believe it is titled plant only filtration. It's a very interesting read. I learned a lot from everyone's contributions.
Good luck, and keep us updated, i'm looking forward to hearing about it!

 

[AquaAlex1993]

That seems to be quite a bit of fish, but it sounds awesome!
Yes, pothos does use the nitrates to grow and quickly. I use it in the sump of my 150g and it helps, especially with my 2 Oscars that believe that they are really swimming pigs. I just stuck the roots and a bit of the stem in the water and it has been growing and helping clean my water for about a year now.
Read up on the sticky in the filtration section, I believe it is titled plant only filtration. It's a very interesting read. I learned a lot from everyone's contributions.
Good luck, and keep us updated, i'm looking forward to hearing about it!

Yea it does look like a lot of fish. Things can change and this isn't a stock set in stone so it may lessen. But yes, I am heading over to the filtration system now and am going to read that. Thank you very much.