I was curious and interested in making my 10 gallon tall tank into a planted tank for ghost/cherry shrimp and a few algae eaters or tetras. The problem is ive never really had a planted tank. I understand the plants need CO2 to grow .. Can I just add fish and will they release enough CO2 to supply the plants? Will I have to buy a CO2 machines (keep in mind i have a low low budget). Any info would be great, thanks
Noobie questions about planted tanks
- Thread starter AionAris
- Start date
You can do without CO2 with a lot of plant like Amazon swords, anubias, and and many others. Imo the lighting and ferts are more important than CO2. But that would all depend on plant you're planning on getting.
To my knowledge, shrimp can't tolerate a high concentration of Co2. If you did add any fish, they would have to be small, non aggressive fish. Small fish don't tend to produce a whole lot of waste, and as such, you might want to invest in some low maintenance plants. Most plants will grow without added Co2. With the right substrate, you won't even have to dose for many months. I've used Eco-Complete in my ten gallon, and Flourite (sand as well as large red granules) for my other planted tanks. I do dose Flourish excel, which is a liquid carbon supplement, twice a week, just to help fight back some algae. Again though, I've been cautioned against doing so with shrimpies. Possibly the two best low maintenance plants on the market are various Anubias, as well as Java Fern. If you are looking for a carpeting effect, I'd personally do dwarf Sagittarria, despite it being a relatively slow grower, it will fill in very nicely.
Many Tetra will eat shrimp of just about any size. In my experience, and others that I've asked about the topic, Celestial Pearl Danios, or Galaxy Rasboras (common names) tend to do the best with Cherry shrimp. Though recently I have heard of them occasionally eating the shrimp fry.
You shouldn't just add the shrimp to the tank, as shrimp tend to be quite sensitive. Let the tank cycle for a bit longer than you normally would, and check your parameters about twice a week during the set-up stage, just to make sure that everything is stable. Honestly, I'd give it about a month with plants in it prior to adding shrimp.
Hope this helped, and GL
Many Tetra will eat shrimp of just about any size. In my experience, and others that I've asked about the topic, Celestial Pearl Danios, or Galaxy Rasboras (common names) tend to do the best with Cherry shrimp. Though recently I have heard of them occasionally eating the shrimp fry.
You shouldn't just add the shrimp to the tank, as shrimp tend to be quite sensitive. Let the tank cycle for a bit longer than you normally would, and check your parameters about twice a week during the set-up stage, just to make sure that everything is stable. Honestly, I'd give it about a month with plants in it prior to adding shrimp.
Hope this helped, and GL
^ So far i haven't had any problems with pumping Co2 into my Crystal Red Shrimp tanks, the only times i had problems was when i was actually using Flourish Excel... but once i stopped dosing the Excel, all my shrimp started to berry up nicely, so as a word of advice, if you are going to get plants that require Co2, make sure you invest in a Co2 pressurized kit and skip using excel...
As for the baby shrimp, any fish will have a chance of eating the shrimp fry if they can get to them, so having a heavily planted tank with some moss would help if you are to keep fish with them....
As for the baby shrimp, any fish will have a chance of eating the shrimp fry if they can get to them, so having a heavily planted tank with some moss would help if you are to keep fish with them....