Widow Twanky

Hi Folks

I'm new here so be gentle with me! I have a 145L Freshwater tank. This was a really successful tank a year ago with 3 x Clown Loach 2 x Rainbow shark and about 10 x guppies all of whom where breeding happily. We came home after a day out to find that the heater thermometer had malfunctioned and heated the tank to well over 90 and all but 1 x Rainbow shark died.
Feeling very depressed I left the tank with just the RS in it for about a year. Yesterday I restocked with 7 x Guppies.
I have 2 x Fluval internal filters running, but am considering changing them to a an external filter. So my question is what is best if my guppies (fingers crossed) start to produce fry? I would like to have the returned water coming back into the tank via a spray pipe (would I still need an air stone if I did this?)
Not sure if I should ask the next question here or start another thread, but I would also like to have a little more success with my plants. In the past, I put plants in the fish eat them or they die off. Should this be a consideration when purchasing a new filter, are some more beneficial to plants than others?
Thanks for taking the time to read!

COBettaCouple

Welcome to Fishlore.

With fry, we use either sponge filters or put fish net netting over the intake of a regular filter.

Dino

What you are looking for are called prefilter sponges.
They fit over the open part of a filter tube.

The spray pipe would not totally remove the need for the air wand, as the water movement from the air wand is usually deeper inthe water than the spray penetrates.
However, if you have good water movement from the filters, neither is absolutly necessary.

As long as you are getting decent gas exchange by water movement ( if you are not injecting CO2) there is not much difference to the plants with filters.

Welcome to Fishlore!!