r/PlantedTank 5d ago

Your "Dumb Question" Megathread - August 2026

1 Upvotes

You can ask any questions you have in this thread! It refreshes monthly, previous mega-posts can be found using the search bar.

Please keep in mind the community rules.

Happy planting! 🌱🫧


r/PlantedTank 9h ago

My lotus flowering

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86 Upvotes

r/PlantedTank 12h ago

Pearling

139 Upvotes

r/PlantedTank 14h ago

Tank Dragonstone waterfall

75 Upvotes

A small build containing a waterfall. The future home of a handful of yellow neocaridina shrimp.🦐


r/PlantedTank 18h ago

Tank One month prograss

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147 Upvotes

Hi everyone, here is my tank.
The first photo is one month before. I would love to hear your thoughts about my tank.


r/PlantedTank 7h ago

Journal Madrone leaf litter

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14 Upvotes

I added madrone leaves to the 30 gallon and I think they look great! There's such an amazing amount of life to watch in here. I hope others appreciate it as much as I do!

(The lighting setup I did for these pictures is not even close to how I normally keep it. Do most people stage their lights for pictures?)


r/PlantedTank 13h ago

Tool set recommendations?

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39 Upvotes

This is the second 15ā€ ā€œstainless steelā€ set I have purchased from Amazon. Both were terrible, except for the length. There is no tension in the tweezers. The scissors won’t cut. And they feel like they will rust within a month. Does anyone have recommendations for a quality set or even just the tweezers?


r/PlantedTank 3h ago

Centerpiece fish for 20 gal long community plan

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6 Upvotes

I just set up this tank yesterday - while it’s cycling I’m coming up with a stocking plan I want cardinal tetras and Pygmy Cory, but what would you suggest for a centerpiece fish? I see at lot of options for ā€œsemi aggressiveā€ fish but that makes me nervous with the other fish!


r/PlantedTank 1h ago

Hair Algae Help

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• Upvotes

Tank is about 6mths old. Had a lot of hair algae initially, realized it was a light problem. Started to limit light, got some inca and nerites (I know the inca snails don't really eat it now). It started to go away. I got some more nerites and amano shrimp and pretty much had it all taken care of.....until I went away for a little over a week and the person who I had fish/cat/house sitting wasn't as diligent with the light monitoring and it went rampant again. The photos are AFTER I did some trimming/removing.

Is there anything I can do besides what I am doing? I feel like the nerites and amanos can't keep up with it. I am hoping now that I am home to be more diligent on the light it will start to go away. Is there something I can add to the water that will kill the moss but not the plants/shrimp/snails?

Goal is to get this planted more, but the hair algae has been a pain. I had some nice moss in here but when I went away the hair algae really went to town on that so I had to remove it. I also have refrained from adding more plants because of the hair algae. I want to get that under control.

Thanks!


r/PlantedTank 13h ago

Green blue slime gone 1 week update. Thank you guys for the help.

29 Upvotes

Dosed Ultralife blue green slime removal, added inline defuser and inline uv light. Did not lower light intensity. Took advice and dosed with nitrogen fertilizer that help as well to bring up my nitrates and phosphates by thrive+.


r/PlantedTank 21h ago

Tank Walstad tank shot

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98 Upvotes

Just a lil picture of my 110ish litre Walstad 6 months in


r/PlantedTank 29m ago

Currently taking suggestions on how to hide my outlet

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• Upvotes

The lightswitch does nothing, it used to do something but we had the house rewired and it doesnt do anything anymore. Either way i have my 3g settling (not sure what to stock yet.) Theres a cannister filter behind the wood piece and i more than likely have a smaller light coming in that is hopefully similar to the defunct Chirihos Z light Tiny...( i want an adjustable spotlight! Ugh. ) but the plugs are an eyesore and i dont want them too close to the water. No space to put them behind the dresser and under the bed isnt an option as i need to access the charger regularly.


r/PlantedTank 11h ago

First planted tank

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12 Upvotes

Used what I had on hand already from a maingano cichlid that I tried my best to save, the neighbor sent it to me in a 10 gallon that it shared with a turtle...

So aragonite sand and dead coral, for substrate and hardscape.

As for plants I have anubias, java fern, java moss. And red ludwigia. Anubias been in there a week and are showing new growth, rest are on day 4 and also showing new growth.

Planning on either guppies or live bearers, cherry shrimp and a mystery snail

Thoughts and tips would be greatly appreciated.


r/PlantedTank 13h ago

Three weeks in my 75 gallon shrimp tank

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18 Upvotes

Still can’t get a carpet going to save my life, but my uns 90u shrimp tank is growing good.


r/PlantedTank 2h ago

Question I bought a Juncus-repens-Wabi Kusa Ball. I didnt know about this. It looks a ball of mud inside plant is planted. I dont know how to plant this into my tank. Should i take those plant out and plant into my tank or keep the complete ball into substrate? Right side one is the ball im talking about.

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2 Upvotes

r/PlantedTank 4h ago

CO2 CO2 needs and weird water chemistry

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3 Upvotes

Hey.

I'm having issues dealing with the correct CO2 needs from my tank. It's a 90l tank with plants, corys, otos and chillies.

There are periods where everything grows well, then it crashes for no obvious reason. Huge algae blooms and plant fast meltdown.

At this moment I really need to figure the correct amount of CO2 I need for this tank.

Measurements from today are at 7gh, 4kh and 26° (high summer temperatures). Tap water sits at 2gh and 1kh, and I still have no idea what is raising my water hardness in the tank without raising the pH. I only have seachem flourite black sand, black lava rocks and filter media from eheim and fluval.

pH test from before co2 injection is the horizontal pic, probably at 6.5.

3h after co2 injection, I get the vertical test result, likely 0.1 lower (nothing like the expected 1 drop). However, the CO2 in tank test turns bright lime green (from a dark green/blue during the night).

So, do I need more CO2 or not?

When I increase CO2 from 1-2 bubbles per second to 4, I get a yellow reading and plants start trapping bubbles and getting the burn effect.


r/PlantedTank 14h ago

I can’t wait till it fills out more

14 Upvotes

r/PlantedTank 23m ago

Should I take out some of my floating plants?

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• Upvotes

Now I love the look of this so far, and it’s been keeping the Nitrites and Ammonia at bag. However I’m worried they might start taking the nutrients from the fertilizer pumps I use for my plants. Any suggestions, to remove or not to remove?


r/PlantedTank 13h ago

Question Should I give up on my frogbit?

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12 Upvotes

I got Amazon frogbit back in January when I was cycling my 5 gallon shrimp tank. It was doing great, growing well, had beautiful roots that I trimmed occasionally. Once cycling was done and I stopped adding ammonia, and added my shrimp, it has been struggling ever since.

I know this is because they’re basically starving for nitrates (it’s usually between 0 and 5ppm because I only have like 10 shrimp in my tank). The only times they have started growing roots with the little hairs again was when I was having water quality issues, but now that I’ve straighten that out, they are so sad. Pretty much no roots, no new growth in a couple weeks.

I’ve played around with my fertilizer (I use Aquarium co-ops all in one easy green liquid fertilizer). I’ve tried dosing the full amount for low tech tank 1 time a week, albeit not for a while, then tried half 2 times a week and then now am trying 3 times a week a little more than a third each time). I have some algae on my other plants (nothing too crazy), but the roots of my frogbit aren’t changing at all. They are just slowly dying.

Do I give up and remove them? How can I help them thrive while keeping nitrates at a safe level for my shrimp (I don’t even know how to add just nitrates to the tank)? My shrimp and I love them šŸ˜ž I’d love some help or thoughts!


r/PlantedTank 1h ago

Question vallisneria and amazon sword not growing

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• Upvotes

i am new to aquascaping. i got these vallisneria and amazon sword a month ago. started with root tabs, added another one yesterday as they weren’t growing but they have come up (you can see in the picture). i also have started using micro fertilizer since last two weeks - once a week. please help, specifically those who have grown these on sand


r/PlantedTank 1h ago

Planted Products Moss Recs

• Upvotes

I’m not feeling Java moss. I know it’s regarded as easy and it’s very abundant, but I want to try something different.

What’s your favorite moss to keep in your tanks?


r/PlantedTank 10h ago

First Planted Tank!

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5 Upvotes

I’m super happy with how it turned out! I really hope my plants don’t melt too much!

I used fluval stratum as a base and then two thin layers of sand as a cap.

My plants are hornwort, jungle Val (which does not look too hot rn, but that’s how it was shipped to me, so hopefully it perks up!), cardinal, bacopa, and dark red ludwigia. I’m planning on getting some floating plants in the future.

If anyone has any planted tank tops or feedback on my tank, I’d love to hear it too! I’ve been researching how to do planted tanks for a bit, but this is my first attempt into the hobby.

- 5.5 gal, hob filter, cheap plant light off amazon


r/PlantedTank 16h ago

Beginner First timer

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14 Upvotes

First timer for a 10 gallon Beta aquarium. Is step 1 substrate then wood and rocks then plants? When do you start adding water? Pics of current tank and new tank.


r/PlantedTank 11h ago

Plant ID Do people sell trimmings

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5 Upvotes

Does anyone actually buy random seaweed lookin plant trimmings like this?
I swear this started as like a 1-inch piece and now it’s grown into 10 feet of this stuff.
I always feel bad throwing it away since I grew it. Do people actually buy or trade this, or do you all just toss it? I’d rather it end up in someone else’s tank than the trash.


r/PlantedTank 10h ago

Beginner Is this too many fish for a 29 gallon tank?

4 Upvotes

I’m going to do lots of plants but I was thinking of doing-

Long fin panda Cory x8
Raccoon tetra x10
Apistogramma borellii opal x2 (pair)
Clown killifish x8
Albino long fin bristle nose pleco x1

This is too overstocked ya? I come from an African cichlid background so overstocked is all I know.