Moving from fake to real

Over the past few months I've been slowly moving my 20g from fake to real plants (easy to care for ones). Still plenty of fake ones but I'm wondering if I need to actually start attending to these plants more and think about some type of fertilizer, a better light, etc. Also, I'm wondering if all of my plants will stop any algae from growing and my hillstream loaches and snails won't be as happy.

They are all pretty randomly placed in the tank but the first plant I put in was a pothos on top, then it was a Java fern and little anubias I got from petco in those tubes (surprisingly still alive). I then got a pack of bulbs, two of which are growing nicely, still waiting to see if the water onion sprouts at all. Then a few clumps of dwarf hair grass. I then covered the terracotta pot in java moss. This week I got a big rotala and some frogbit (or maybe duckweed?).

 

Yes, plants need to be fertilized. Look up some fertilizers for low-tech tanks, and use according to the instructions. How long have these stones been in the tank? They look so clean, despite the tank looking brightly lit. In my tank all stones are covered in algae despite me having a whole bunch of plants, but TBH the plants have some algae on them too, so I guess they're not doing that great

 

Thanks for the reply. The rocks used to have a bit of algae, same for the decor but the hillstreams and snails have cleaned them up quite a bit. I use algae wafers now and the hillstreams eat any pellets or other food they find.

 

Live plants will certainly need cared for. And some will need trimmed or they will overtake your tank.
But they are more beneficial than artificial plants. There's a big upside.

 

Lookin' good but it'll need maintaining (trimming, fertilizing etc). The best liquid fert I found for low-tech, low to medium-light tanks is Easy Green. It's a good price and a breeze to measure. Best of all, it won't grow algae (unless using activated carbon but I've explained that too many times before).

I should mention egeria (anacharis/elodea), may kill off the bottom section, float for more light then take over. Trim bi-weekly to keep it under control.

Java fern and anubias are great. I've had windelov for 3 years in low to med lighting and basically none, yet it still clones and thrives!

To add, you might have issues with the rotala and hairgrass. Most rotala crave high lighting and CO2 supplementation, same with DHG. You don't have high, probably even medium lighting and probably don't want to risk CO2. Just keep the receipt and a close eye on those two

 

Cool, thanks all for the replies. I'm looking at one of the simple, all-in-one liquid ferts. I don't have activated carbon in my filter so that shouldn't be an issue.

I'll keep my eye on the rotala and hairgrass. Should I consider tab ferts for them in addition to the liquid fert?

 

Tab fertilizers like root tabs are good for plants that get their nutrients from the substrate, like Crypts and Swords. But for stem plants and the others you have listed, they are going to get their nutrients from the water column, so a liquid fertilizer would be best. I usually recommend Flourish, Flourish Excel and Iron as the three liquid essentials for plants that are solid green. Stay away from anything that has red, pink, purple, or basically not solid green (those are going to need a lot more work). But those are the three best products I have used and highly recommend. I've used the all in ones before like Easy Green, but you can't control the different elements based off what your plants need more of (different plants will need more or less of things like potassium, nitrogen, phosphate, etc.)

Super easy plants I recommend to start with would be Bacopa, Wisteria, Water Sprite and Hygrophilas ☺️