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New Member
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Last Login: 11/6/2009 8:52:10 AM
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I was wondering what would be best. Live plants or Fake plants.
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Fishkeeping GURU
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It depends on your situation. Tell us about your set up (fish, tank size, lighting), and tell us whether you'd rather have something easy to take care of or more challenging but more natural.
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Starting Member
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Last Login: 3/19/2010 10:52:56 AM
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| As much as I love my live plants, the algae problem that I've been dealing with for about a month now has me missing the ease of the old bleach dip for cleaning artificial plants. I won't get rid of my plants in my 55G community tank, but I've decided the new tank I'm planning is gonna be all artificial, maybe a "fake" reef with dwarf cichlids or something in it. The live plants are great, but they are a lot more work, and I already spend a lot of time outside tending my flower gardens before I can come in and work on the tank plants, so I'd just caution against getting into live plants until you've done some research and planning (which I didn't - doh!!!). A good starter plan is to go with low-light, slow-growing plants till you've gotten through the first few "messes" and feel like expanding.
---------------------------------------------------------------- 55G, hard water, Flourish Excel for CO2, aquaclear filters, T5HO lights platys, guppies, otos, & white clouds - bronze and green corys - farlowella (small variety) - siamese algae eaters - MTS snails
broadleaved, rosette, red melon sword, ozelot, radican marble queen, ruffle, rangeri, & micro swords - green & narrow green temple - wisteria - egeria densa & egeria najas - red ludwigia - green cabomba - banana plant - red & green & orange sunset wendtii crypts - balansae, spiralis, & retrospiralis crypts - anubias nana - hornwort - bacopa - java fern - java moss - water sprite - red & green tiger lotus - red myrio
29G unplanted rescue tank with 18 yr old common pleco, small com. pleco, 10 yr old upside-down catfish, aquatic frog
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Starting Member
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Last Login: Today @ 9:06:19 PM
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I have all low light plants and find the maintenance to be no different. My Anacharis (or elodea) is a little bit of a pain since it needs constant trim due to its growth rate. I think the look is just so much more natural thank fake plants.
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Swifty
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Starting Member
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Last Login: 3/19/2010 10:52:56 AM
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| Plus if you spend the money on the good quality-made artificials you're gonna be spending more than for real plants (after the initial investment in substrate and lighting if needed). And, because the prices for many plants are very reasonable (all mine were under $10, many under $5) it's not a big deal to replace something if it doesn't look right in your setup or you just decide you don't like it anymore. Of course, it's better for your fish in most cases to have live plants. And the tank is always changing, which is nice: 
one month later with a little rearranging . . . 
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55G, hard water, Flourish Excel for CO2, aquaclear filters, T5HO lights platys, guppies, otos, & white clouds - bronze and green corys - farlowella (small variety) - siamese algae eaters - MTS snails
broadleaved, rosette, red melon sword, ozelot, radican marble queen, ruffle, rangeri, & micro swords - green & narrow green temple - wisteria - egeria densa & egeria najas - red ludwigia - green cabomba - banana plant - red & green & orange sunset wendtii crypts - balansae, spiralis, & retrospiralis crypts - anubias nana - hornwort - bacopa - java fern - java moss - water sprite - red & green tiger lotus - red myrio
29G unplanted rescue tank with 18 yr old common pleco, small com. pleco, 10 yr old upside-down catfish, aquatic frog
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Starting Member
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Last Login: 7/20/2010 5:33:05 PM
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Live plants cae be bothersome but nothing else looks as natural.
In my 20L I have live plants.
In my 10 I have silk.
I say that if you go fake maybe silk is the only way to go. They still look fake but not as bad as the plastic plants.
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New Member
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Last Login: 11/6/2009 8:52:10 AM
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I have a 20gal H tank. I have decided to go with both some fake and live plants. I have also added a nice rock where the fish can swim through.
I have 6 tiger barbs right now in the tank and when I added the live plants, boy did they really start swimming around, in school and in and out of the plants and rock.
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New Member
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Last Login: 11/6/2009 8:52:10 AM
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Very cool.
[quote]Scooter65 (7/29/2009)
Plus if you spend the money on the good quality-made artificials you're gonna be spendingmore than for real plants (after the initial investment in substrate and lighting if needed). And, because the prices for many plants are very reasonable (all mine were under $10, many under $5) it's not a big deal to replace something if it doesn't look right in your setup or you just decide you don't like it anymore. Of course, it's better for your fish in most cases to have live plants. And the tank is always changing, which is nice:
onemonth later with a little rearranging . . .
[/quote]
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Starting Member
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Last Login: 7/19/2010 6:13:48 PM
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Scooter65 (7/28/2009)
As much as I love my live plants, the algae problem that I've been dealing with for about a month now has me missing the ease of the old bleach dip for cleaning artificial plants. I won't get rid of my plants in my 55G community tank, but I've decided the new tank I'm planning is gonna be all artificial, maybe a "fake" reef with dwarf cichlids or something in it. The live plants are great, but they are a lot more work, and I already spend a lot of time outside tending my flower gardens before I can come in and work on the tank plants, so I'd just caution against getting into live plants until you've done some research and planning (which I didn't - doh!!!). A good starter plan is to go with low-light, slow-growing plants till you've gotten through the first few "messes" and feel like expanding. You know I kind of feel the same way recently. When I first got into live plants I tried different kinds but have settled on java fern and java moss mainly due to maintence issues. I don't even use fertilizer much due to the algae issues and they are still growing. Maybe they get enough trace nutrients from the frequent water changes I do. But then again I don't need a jungle/showcase planted tank to be content. Also it probably depends on your interests. My favorite tank look has always been a few plants here and there and other stuff like rocks/driftwood.
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Starting Member
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Last Login: 9/29/2009 12:07:55 PM
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In my experience, you can easily find live plants that take very little care to maintain. I bought a coffee-leaf anubias (with about 6 leaves on it) for $7 at my LFS, put it in a fake lava rock (with a hole cut in it to put your plant) and have done nothing special to it for a year and a half. Now, it's split into two plants, each one with about 20 leaves and it's still going strong.
I highly recommend any type of anubias as they are typically very low-light, low-maintenance plants that most fish (and even my snails) won't eat.
Java Fern is similar, and looks great when you get it to attach to a piece of driftwood!
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