Plants with Cichlids??

[stribbelldk]

Hey, I was wondering if there are people with plants in a cichlid tank? If so what plants?

I have 6 Electic yellows , 6 Electric blues, 6 Red empress 7 Petricola and 2 BN.

Ph is 8.0, Nitrite, nitrate and ammonia is low or at zero.

I have a 90 gal tank with the Coralife Lunar lights 2- 10k halide, 2 10k atinic and 4 small lunar lights. More than enough for most plants I am told.

My temp is consistanly around 80 F.

Whole tank set up for appox. 8 months.

I was told I can put Java fern in and one other but I forget the name. Any other Ideas??? I wound like one plant that is kinda big and some low lying plants

Derek

[Vallisneria]

Personally I have never had any luck with plants in my 90g african tank(yellow labs, red emp, acei, pheno, synos). They fish would eat them and within a day or 2 the poor plants were jsut stems. I tried a variety of "hardy" plants but it never worked out in my tank.

Other people have had success so i think its something you just have to try out for yourself. Some hardy plants to test out are Vallisneria, Java ferns, and Anubias.

[jvision]

There are species of Val that are native to the Rift Lakes (well, if not native, they grow there). I've had success w. Val, Java fern and Anubias; however, stem plants and other soft-leaf plants were doomed.

[Fishful Thinking]

I currently have two annubius surviving in my rift lake tank. They have some holes in some of the leaves, but overall they are still growing.

[African_Fever]

I currently have jungle val, anubias, crypts, and a little bit of java fern in my cichlid tanks. I've never had a tank that I couldn't keep the plants alive in, but I think that's due to lots of light and having the plants well established before the fish are added in most instances.

[Brenda4]

I have vals-tiger,reg in with red wendtii and java fern,they ate anubis,which I just saved in time.Also have hornwort,I think it grows fast enough,any eaten is not missed.

[seajays]

Here is some info.

http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Plants/cichlids.html

[RDFISHGUY]

I have anubias and jungle vals that I got from African Fever in my 230 gal. The secret is to plant lots, or , like African Fever said add fish to an established planted tank. The first time I tried to add plants to my tank my fish went on a feeding frenzy and the plants got shredded. I rescued the nubs that were left and grew them out in a 55 gal for almost a year. When I began to have a hard time seeing through the mass of plants I decided to put them back in my 230, twice as many this time . So far so good , they do eat them still but with so many in there they still grow and are putting out runners so it seems to be working better this time around. Here's a pic:

[RDFISHGUY]

Plants did well for a couple of months but in the past week something happened that the fish decided they were food . They have taken a good chunk of my vals out but have left my anubias alone.

[stribbelldk]

Awesome. :thumbs:

Thanks for the advise. I think I might try some in my tank but I need a spare tank incase we have a feeding frenzy.

My fish room should be set up by aug or sept. I might have to try then.

Derek

[sharuq1]

I had some in with mine for a while. some got eaten but the main problem was they were constantly being uprooted.