How To Aquascape Freswater Aquarium myaquascaping1.blogspot.co.id Already know aquascaping for dummies? Or curious aquascape aquarium kit?
The #1 mistake that Aquascapers make is choosing the wrong plant for their tank. It can make an otherwise beautiful aquarium look sloppy and unplanned.
Do it right, though, and you're on your way to the top! Let's find out how you can choose the best plants that fit your aquarium.
The 10 Best Freshwater Aquarium Plants for Beginners
Natural plants are the perfect choice for any aquariums, and they're almost a required for Aquascapes. To do it right, you'll need to choose plants that won't immediately die. (It happens to all of us at some point.) Here are the best freshwater plant choices for beginners.
Adding live plants to your aquarium is the best thing you can do for the health of your aquarium. A side effect of live plants is they also look super amazing.
Seriously, how to aquascape freswater aquarium, some of the most appealing aquariums online are made using live plants & hardscapes. This is our personal favorite plant.
If you're a beginner, aquariums like the one pictured above may seem like they're out of reach, but—given some patience and the right knowledge—you'll be quickly on your way to creating beautiful scenes like that in your aquarium.
We have put together a list of our favorite aquarium plants for beginners to help you.
While most plants aren't as sensitive as fish when it comes to water parameters, you'll still need to provide some basic needs for plants to flourish.
Mainly: light (Here is our: LED Aquarium Lighting Guide which you might find helpful), nutrients, and CO2. This is true of all plants, but when you're growing live plants in an aquarium, it's even more important.
Getting these three aspects right will guarantee great plant growth in your aquarium, and you'll find yourself doing regular trimming and maintenance on thriving plants within a few weeks! If you need some help trimming and maintaining plants correctly then check out our trimming guide here.
Beginner Aquarium Plants
These plants are proven to be hard to kill, and tolerable to a variety of water conditions. If this is your first planted tank, you can't go wrong with these plants for freshwater aquariums:
Java Moss, a beginner plant.
This is the most common plant you'll see in aquariums. It literally grows like a weed. While it thrives when given pressurized CO2, it also grows relatively quickly in medium light conditions.
It's usually trimmed early & often to maintain a sort of 'carpet' across the bottom of the aquarium. It's also great for shrimpkeeping, as it provides good cover for baby shrimp.
Note that this plant needs to be anchored to something heavy to prevent it from floating to the top of your tank.
Here are the ideal conditions for Java Moss:
Water Conditions: 72-90 Degrees Farenheight. (Fastest at 73 degrees.) High water movement helps increase growth rate.
Lighting Conditions: Highly tolerable. Best growth in Medium to High light.
Appearance: low growth pattern; tends to create 'carpets' if trimmed correctly.
You'll see later that there are some popular plants in this list. Well, this is the most popular freshwater aquarium plant you'll find in the hobby.
It's almost impossible to completely kill with even the most basic of maintenance, and—when done correctly—still makes for incredibly beautiful aquariums. This winning combination is what makes this plant so popular.
It's also perfectly suitable for breeding fish and shrimp—its microscopic bacterial life provides a great supplementary food source for fry.
There have also been some creative uses of Java Moss, including attaching it to 'balls' that are placed in the aquarium when needed. (It's much easier to use for breeding purposes.)
Marsilea Minuta
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium, If you keep it trimmed tightly, this plant carpets quite easily. It's also very easy to determine whether it's getting enough nutrients, as well: it'll start losing its vibrant green color, yellowing over time. That's when you know to modify your dosing!
Marsilea Minuta grows best in these conditions:
Water Conditions: 73-78 degrees Farenheight; tolerable of most conditions.
Lighting Conditions: Grows best in medium light; will tolerate other situations.
Appearance: Has a 'clover' appearance. Creates a unique 'carpet' of sorts.
Marsilea Minuta also creates a unique carpet, since it's more of a cloved, leafy plant. It tends to hold waste under its leaves, so you'll need to be vigilant in keeping it clean!
It's also worth pointing out that this plant does best in a nutrient-rich substrate like CarbiSea Eco-Complete or Fluval Stratum.
While it does use nutrients in the water column, for the fastest & healthiest growth, you'll want to use a planted aquarium substrate like those.
Pygmy Chain Sword
This plant is a particularly familiar feature to most of us: it's the aquatic version of what's in your lawn. How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium- When it's taken care of, Chain Sword can give your aquarium that extra 'finished' look. (It's also quite tolerable of many water conditions.)
Water Conditions: 72-78 degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: Grows best in high lighting situations.
Appearance: Looks astonishingly like the grass in your lawn.
It's best featured by placing it around the aquarium hardscape, providing a gentler edge to an otherwise hard feature in the tank.
Take care when planting Chain Sword (especially the Pygmy variety) to use a powder-type substrate for optimal carpeting. The smaller granules helps the plant take hold faster, and helps to prevent the plant from floating upwards when it's pearling.
Staurogyne repens
This is a good option if you are looking for hardy aquarium plants, easily-grown plant that's perfect for the foreground of your aquarium. Originally found in the Amazonas, it's quite bushy, and grows small green leaves.
It's perfect for placement around the hardscape of your aquarium, and looks great when it forms bushes around your stone!
Water Conditions: 76 Degrees farenheight. Highly tolerable temperature range.
Lighting Conditions: Carpets in high light situations; tolerable of medium light.
Appearance: Bushy growth with horizontally spreading patterns.
This plant spread via side shoots just above/below the substrate, which makes for a great carpet when planting and trimming consistently.
When you first plant this, don't be afraid to liberally cut back the stems—this is a heavy root plant, meaning it'll grow a bunch of roots before spreading visually. This helps speed up that process.
Anubias Nana
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium-Anubias Nana grows quite well from trimmings, so it's quite easily propagated in an aquarium. It's hard for beginners to kill, and its size makes it perfect as a midground plant.
Also, this is the plant you see on many aquarium videos producing the stream of bubbles from its leaves. (It's an interesting addition to your tank, and one that's sure to attract attention! but definitely a contender as one of the best foreground aquarium plants)
Water Conditions: 72-78 degrees Farenheight.
Lighting Conditions: Optimal growth in medium-high lighting.
Appearance: Curved stems with rounded leaves.
There are dwarf varieties of this plant that are also fit for beginner aquariums, and are perfect for foreground features, or smoothing out the transition between your hardscape and substrate.
These are another extremely popular plant for most aquariums. They're hardy, tolerable of many common water conditions, and easily maintained. I'll warn you, however: these get large. A full-size Amazon Sword when fanned out can be as large as 24"—around the size of a beachball. However, regular trimming tends to help keep it to a manageable size.
They're perfect as a background plant, since their tall, broad leaves help block out the background behind the tank, and they're great for many different types of fish & other aquatic life.
Java Ferns
This is a very low maintenance plant. You'll likely have no trouble keeping these alive, and with a very unique look, it's no surprise that they're another highly popular beginner aquarium plant.
It also has the unique ability to work well in nearly any location of your aquarium's aquascape—the bunching growth of Java Ferns keeps it tidy no matter where you put it.
Full-grown, these aquarium plants will reach around 8 inches tall, and spread via rhizomes. You'll also likely see 'adventitious' plants coming from leaves and roots, which simply means that it'll put out leaves as it spread on your aquarium's substrate.
Pogostemon Helferi, an aquarium plant for beginner freshwater aquarists.
Pogostemon Helferi
Other than an awesome name, these plant is one of the most unique you'll find for freshwater aquariums. You might also see this plant referred to as 'Downoi', but they're the same plant species.
Water Conditions: 74-78 Degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium- Growth is optimal in medium lighting
Appearance: Detailed 'zigzag' pattern; unique to freshwater aquariums.
The biggest feature of this plant is its 'zigzag' pattern—one of the more unique leaf types available to freshwater aquascapers. Downoi grows in a circular pattern that fits perfectly in foreground aquascapes. Place this in front of your hardscape (specifically seiryu stone), and you'll have a winning combination for your aquarium.
Crypt Wenditii is a hardy plant that's perfect for beginner freshwater aquariums.
Crypt Wendtii
If you read a bit about Crypts, you'll probably find a few horror stories of purchasing this plant, only to have it completely 'melt', or decay, away.
Water Conditions: 72-78 Degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: Grows best in low lighting due to slow growth
Appearance: Varied, thin to medium-thickness leaves that grow quite long
This is extremely common for this species, but—if you give it some time, it'll come back as a tough, vigorous plant. These are fast growth plants—it'll take a while for it to get to its full size, but it does quite well in low-light conditions, and is very tolerable of many types of water conditions. I personally have crypts in my tanks in my home.
This is a beautifully-carpeting plant that's at home in any beginner's aquarium, as well as veteran aquascapers alike. It's primarily meant as a foreground plant, never growing above ~2 inches in height. It grows exceptionally fast, so give it even the most basic care, and it'll give you a beautiful carpet in return.
Water Conditions: 70-83 Degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: Carpets in medium to high light
Appearance: Short, plentiful leaves that appear to 'carpet' the substrate
It's perfectly used as a spawning medium, How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium, providing safety to fry after birth, as well as general protection in community aquariums.
Aquascape Aquarium Design Ideas
For many fish tank hobbyists, aquascaping or aquarium aquascape design can be one of the most enjoyable parts about setting up a fish tank.
Decorating your aquarium can be quite fun, but coming up with a good aquarium aquascape is not just about making the tank look nice. You really should take into account the tank's future inhabitants when figuring out what you need to do.
This is where you get to exercise both sides of your brain to try and come up with something that is not only nice to look at but something that is functional as well.
Research Fish and Animals First
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Ideally, you should research and decide on the fish and any other animals you want to keep before you even buy a tank. Many freshwater hobbyists think the common pleco is a cool fish to have and indeed it is.
But, the common pleco really has no place in a tank smaller than 55 gallons as adults.
Many saltwater hobbyists are really taken by many of the tangs (surgeonfish). Without research, they have no clue that tangs really need a large tank for adequate swimming space.
Dottybacks are another popular species and one that needs hiding spaces to feel secure. Creating hiding places for your dottyback is an important consideration in your aquarium aquascaping plans.
For the future reef tank keepers out there, some corals need intense aquarium lighting whereas others prefer less lighting.
Figuring out which corals you would like to keep may dictate your aquarium aquascape and the arrangement of the saltwater live rock in your tank.
For instance, if you want to keep some light loving corals you may need to build up the rockwork so that you could place these corals with the intense lighting requirements higher in the tank.
Hopefully you can start to see the importance of figuring out what you want to keep before you buy your first piece of fish tank equipment.
Keep Aquarium Maintenance In Mind
You've got your tank setup and your aquascape looks fantastic! Everyone compliments you on how nice it looks and you're feeling really good.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - However, a week or two goes by and it's time for some routine fish tank maintenance tasks.
Namely, scraping the tank glass to get rid of some unsightly algae that is starting to grow on the front viewing panel of the tank.
But wait, aah man, I've put the rock too close to the front glass and I can't get the scraper in between the rock and the glass. Doh!
Another favorite task of many aquarists is gravel vacuuming. Yeah! Don't you just love vacuuming the gravel? Just kidding.
However, what must be done, must be done. It's time for another - doh! I've grouped too many of these plants together and it's going to be darn near impossible to effectively clean the gravel in that part of the tank.
Looks like the beginnings of a small nitrate factory in the making, which may be a big headache down the road.
The point here is that you want to aquascape effectively. Arrange the fish tank so that future tank maintenance tasks remain as easy and efficient as possible.
Aquarium ornaments
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Roman columns, the Parthenon, funny signs, the classic treasure chest or underwater diver that does double duty as a bubbler, small replica bridges, sunken ships, replica battleships, you name it.
The amount of available aquarium decor is vast. Kids almost unanimously get that small underwater diver in their first tank. You know the one.
It has a red diving suit and the bubble mask that is waving hello. It's almost like a right of passage of some sort.
Driftwood
Often seen in live plant setups, a nice piece of driftwood can be a great centerpiece of the aquascape in a freshwater tank. It Is about complete How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium.
Don't just pick any old piece of wood and place it into your tank. Get some from you local fish store and ask questions about the curing process.
To be on the safe side, you really need to monitor any wood in a separate quarantine tank and use your aquarium test kit to test the water parameters in the quarantine tank for several weeks or months before you can assume that it's safe to add to your main tank.
Rock
Just like driftwood, rocks can make nice additions to freshwater tanks. You sometimes see larger flat shaped rocks that can form ledges that provide hiding places for your fish.
A lot of African cichlid lovers really like Texas Holey rock because it contains limestone that slowly dissolves in the tank water increasing the buffering capacity.
Just like the driftwood, you will want to thoroughly clean any rock and quarantine it for several weeks/months before putting it into a display tank.
Fake Plants
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - The nice thing about fake plants is the ease of cleaning them. The bad thing about fake plants is that, well, they sometimes look really fake - especially when the base of the artificial plant pokes out of the substrate.
These can sometimes detract from the aquascape... but if done right, you can pull it off.
Live Plants
Live aquarium plants provide functionality as well as beauty. Nitrate removal, oxygenation, shelter and breeding sites are just some of the wonderful benefits of keeping live aquarium plants.
Live plants kept properly can help create some truly breathtaking, realistic looking aquarium scenes.
There are many live aquarium plants available each having differing lighting and supplement requirements. Research any live plants that you're interested in beforehand is the key.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Fake Coral or Dead Coral
Fake or Dead Coral will look nice (depends on who you ask) for a very short period of time in your aquascape and can be a major pain in the butt to clean and will make you wish you never shelled out the money for it.
Try the more natural route (live rock - see below) and avoid fake corals and dead coral skeletons altogether.
Live Corals
The ultimate aquarium decoration that is actually a living animal! Corals are not for the beginner and should be thoroughly researched beforehand because of their often hefty price tag and demanding water, lighting and feeding requirements.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Live Rock
The great part about live rock, aside from the biological importance of using it, is that you can use aquarium silicon sealant to shape the rocks into any type of design you desire for your aquascape.
We now have a new term - "rockscaping". You can also use a drill to create small holes in the rock and use pvc pipes to hold them together to make columns or archways. The rockscaping possibilities are endless.
Another thing you'll probably need to do is place the rock directly on the tank bottom and not on top of the sand. Sand burrowing species could get injured or worse if you place the rock on top of the sand.
Here are some typical saltwater live rock layouts to help kick-start your creative genius.
Front View of Island Aquascape Design
Live Rock Island Aquascape
Front View of Slope Aquascape Design
Live Rock Slope Aquascape
Front View of Cove Aquascape
Live Rock Cove Aquascape
Aquarium Background
The tank's background can sometimes really set off the aquascaping in a tank. You have many options here. There are tons of ready-made tank backgrounds that are of picturesque nature scenes, coral reefs, etc.
Choose one that you like and one that won't clash with what's going to be in the tank.
Another option is to paint the outside back glass of the tank a solid color such as black, dark green, deep blue, slate blue, etc. Appliance spray paint sticks to the glass well.
Many hobbyists like painting the outside back glass better than using a tank background because you don't have to worry about water getting in between the background and the back glass. Believe me, it will happen and then it can be a pain to clean it. It's not as big a problem for freshwater tanks as it is for saltwater tanks.
In marine tanks, salt creep will eventually make its way in between the background and the glass causing unsightly salt creep on the glass.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - More Cool Ideas
For more ideas and to get those creative juices flowing, it can be really helpful to check out what other hobbyists are doing.
Check out the fish tanks in the FishLore fish and aquarium picture gallery and the Your Fish Tank pages to get some ideas.
Once you get your tank set up, How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium, show it off by signing up to become a FishLore member (completely FREE) and you can then upload photos of your masterpiece. Have Fun!
The #1 mistake that Aquascapers make is choosing the wrong plant for their tank. It can make an otherwise beautiful aquarium look sloppy and unplanned.
Do it right, though, and you're on your way to the top! Let's find out how you can choose the best plants that fit your aquarium.
The 10 Best Freshwater Aquarium Plants for Beginners
Natural plants are the perfect choice for any aquariums, and they're almost a required for Aquascapes. To do it right, you'll need to choose plants that won't immediately die. (It happens to all of us at some point.) Here are the best freshwater plant choices for beginners.
Adding live plants to your aquarium is the best thing you can do for the health of your aquarium. A side effect of live plants is they also look super amazing.
Seriously, how to aquascape freswater aquarium, some of the most appealing aquariums online are made using live plants & hardscapes. This is our personal favorite plant.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium
If you're a beginner, aquariums like the one pictured above may seem like they're out of reach, but—given some patience and the right knowledge—you'll be quickly on your way to creating beautiful scenes like that in your aquarium.
We have put together a list of our favorite aquarium plants for beginners to help you.
While most plants aren't as sensitive as fish when it comes to water parameters, you'll still need to provide some basic needs for plants to flourish.
Mainly: light (Here is our: LED Aquarium Lighting Guide which you might find helpful), nutrients, and CO2. This is true of all plants, but when you're growing live plants in an aquarium, it's even more important.
Getting these three aspects right will guarantee great plant growth in your aquarium, and you'll find yourself doing regular trimming and maintenance on thriving plants within a few weeks! If you need some help trimming and maintaining plants correctly then check out our trimming guide here.
Beginner Aquarium Plants
These plants are proven to be hard to kill, and tolerable to a variety of water conditions. If this is your first planted tank, you can't go wrong with these plants for freshwater aquariums:
Java Moss, a beginner plant.
This is the most common plant you'll see in aquariums. It literally grows like a weed. While it thrives when given pressurized CO2, it also grows relatively quickly in medium light conditions.
It's usually trimmed early & often to maintain a sort of 'carpet' across the bottom of the aquarium. It's also great for shrimpkeeping, as it provides good cover for baby shrimp.
Note that this plant needs to be anchored to something heavy to prevent it from floating to the top of your tank.
Here are the ideal conditions for Java Moss:
Water Conditions: 72-90 Degrees Farenheight. (Fastest at 73 degrees.) High water movement helps increase growth rate.
Lighting Conditions: Highly tolerable. Best growth in Medium to High light.
Appearance: low growth pattern; tends to create 'carpets' if trimmed correctly.
You'll see later that there are some popular plants in this list. Well, this is the most popular freshwater aquarium plant you'll find in the hobby.
It's almost impossible to completely kill with even the most basic of maintenance, and—when done correctly—still makes for incredibly beautiful aquariums. This winning combination is what makes this plant so popular.
It's also perfectly suitable for breeding fish and shrimp—its microscopic bacterial life provides a great supplementary food source for fry.
There have also been some creative uses of Java Moss, including attaching it to 'balls' that are placed in the aquarium when needed. (It's much easier to use for breeding purposes.)
Marsilea Minuta
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium, If you keep it trimmed tightly, this plant carpets quite easily. It's also very easy to determine whether it's getting enough nutrients, as well: it'll start losing its vibrant green color, yellowing over time. That's when you know to modify your dosing!
Marsilea Minuta grows best in these conditions:
Water Conditions: 73-78 degrees Farenheight; tolerable of most conditions.
Lighting Conditions: Grows best in medium light; will tolerate other situations.
Appearance: Has a 'clover' appearance. Creates a unique 'carpet' of sorts.
Marsilea Minuta also creates a unique carpet, since it's more of a cloved, leafy plant. It tends to hold waste under its leaves, so you'll need to be vigilant in keeping it clean!
It's also worth pointing out that this plant does best in a nutrient-rich substrate like CarbiSea Eco-Complete or Fluval Stratum.
While it does use nutrients in the water column, for the fastest & healthiest growth, you'll want to use a planted aquarium substrate like those.
Pygmy Chain Sword
This plant is a particularly familiar feature to most of us: it's the aquatic version of what's in your lawn. How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium- When it's taken care of, Chain Sword can give your aquarium that extra 'finished' look. (It's also quite tolerable of many water conditions.)
Water Conditions: 72-78 degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: Grows best in high lighting situations.
Appearance: Looks astonishingly like the grass in your lawn.
It's best featured by placing it around the aquarium hardscape, providing a gentler edge to an otherwise hard feature in the tank.
Take care when planting Chain Sword (especially the Pygmy variety) to use a powder-type substrate for optimal carpeting. The smaller granules helps the plant take hold faster, and helps to prevent the plant from floating upwards when it's pearling.
Staurogyne repens
This is a good option if you are looking for hardy aquarium plants, easily-grown plant that's perfect for the foreground of your aquarium. Originally found in the Amazonas, it's quite bushy, and grows small green leaves.
It's perfect for placement around the hardscape of your aquarium, and looks great when it forms bushes around your stone!
Water Conditions: 76 Degrees farenheight. Highly tolerable temperature range.
Lighting Conditions: Carpets in high light situations; tolerable of medium light.
Appearance: Bushy growth with horizontally spreading patterns.
This plant spread via side shoots just above/below the substrate, which makes for a great carpet when planting and trimming consistently.
When you first plant this, don't be afraid to liberally cut back the stems—this is a heavy root plant, meaning it'll grow a bunch of roots before spreading visually. This helps speed up that process.
Anubias Nana
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium-Anubias Nana grows quite well from trimmings, so it's quite easily propagated in an aquarium. It's hard for beginners to kill, and its size makes it perfect as a midground plant.
Also, this is the plant you see on many aquarium videos producing the stream of bubbles from its leaves. (It's an interesting addition to your tank, and one that's sure to attract attention! but definitely a contender as one of the best foreground aquarium plants)
Water Conditions: 72-78 degrees Farenheight.
Lighting Conditions: Optimal growth in medium-high lighting.
Appearance: Curved stems with rounded leaves.
There are dwarf varieties of this plant that are also fit for beginner aquariums, and are perfect for foreground features, or smoothing out the transition between your hardscape and substrate.
These are another extremely popular plant for most aquariums. They're hardy, tolerable of many common water conditions, and easily maintained. I'll warn you, however: these get large. A full-size Amazon Sword when fanned out can be as large as 24"—around the size of a beachball. However, regular trimming tends to help keep it to a manageable size.
They're perfect as a background plant, since their tall, broad leaves help block out the background behind the tank, and they're great for many different types of fish & other aquatic life.
Java Ferns
This is a very low maintenance plant. You'll likely have no trouble keeping these alive, and with a very unique look, it's no surprise that they're another highly popular beginner aquarium plant.
It also has the unique ability to work well in nearly any location of your aquarium's aquascape—the bunching growth of Java Ferns keeps it tidy no matter where you put it.
Full-grown, these aquarium plants will reach around 8 inches tall, and spread via rhizomes. You'll also likely see 'adventitious' plants coming from leaves and roots, which simply means that it'll put out leaves as it spread on your aquarium's substrate.
Pogostemon Helferi, an aquarium plant for beginner freshwater aquarists.
Pogostemon Helferi
Other than an awesome name, these plant is one of the most unique you'll find for freshwater aquariums. You might also see this plant referred to as 'Downoi', but they're the same plant species.
Water Conditions: 74-78 Degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium- Growth is optimal in medium lighting
Appearance: Detailed 'zigzag' pattern; unique to freshwater aquariums.
The biggest feature of this plant is its 'zigzag' pattern—one of the more unique leaf types available to freshwater aquascapers. Downoi grows in a circular pattern that fits perfectly in foreground aquascapes. Place this in front of your hardscape (specifically seiryu stone), and you'll have a winning combination for your aquarium.
Crypt Wenditii is a hardy plant that's perfect for beginner freshwater aquariums.
Crypt Wendtii
If you read a bit about Crypts, you'll probably find a few horror stories of purchasing this plant, only to have it completely 'melt', or decay, away.
Water Conditions: 72-78 Degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: Grows best in low lighting due to slow growth
Appearance: Varied, thin to medium-thickness leaves that grow quite long
This is extremely common for this species, but—if you give it some time, it'll come back as a tough, vigorous plant. These are fast growth plants—it'll take a while for it to get to its full size, but it does quite well in low-light conditions, and is very tolerable of many types of water conditions. I personally have crypts in my tanks in my home.
This is a beautifully-carpeting plant that's at home in any beginner's aquarium, as well as veteran aquascapers alike. It's primarily meant as a foreground plant, never growing above ~2 inches in height. It grows exceptionally fast, so give it even the most basic care, and it'll give you a beautiful carpet in return.
Water Conditions: 70-83 Degrees Farenheight
Lighting Conditions: Carpets in medium to high light
Appearance: Short, plentiful leaves that appear to 'carpet' the substrate
It's perfectly used as a spawning medium, How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium, providing safety to fry after birth, as well as general protection in community aquariums.
Freshwater Aquarium Aquascape Design Ideas
Aquascape Aquarium Design Ideas
For many fish tank hobbyists, aquascaping or aquarium aquascape design can be one of the most enjoyable parts about setting up a fish tank.
Decorating your aquarium can be quite fun, but coming up with a good aquarium aquascape is not just about making the tank look nice. You really should take into account the tank's future inhabitants when figuring out what you need to do.
This is where you get to exercise both sides of your brain to try and come up with something that is not only nice to look at but something that is functional as well.
Research Fish and Animals First
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Ideally, you should research and decide on the fish and any other animals you want to keep before you even buy a tank. Many freshwater hobbyists think the common pleco is a cool fish to have and indeed it is.
But, the common pleco really has no place in a tank smaller than 55 gallons as adults.
Many saltwater hobbyists are really taken by many of the tangs (surgeonfish). Without research, they have no clue that tangs really need a large tank for adequate swimming space.
Dottybacks are another popular species and one that needs hiding spaces to feel secure. Creating hiding places for your dottyback is an important consideration in your aquarium aquascaping plans.
For the future reef tank keepers out there, some corals need intense aquarium lighting whereas others prefer less lighting.
Figuring out which corals you would like to keep may dictate your aquarium aquascape and the arrangement of the saltwater live rock in your tank.
For instance, if you want to keep some light loving corals you may need to build up the rockwork so that you could place these corals with the intense lighting requirements higher in the tank.
Hopefully you can start to see the importance of figuring out what you want to keep before you buy your first piece of fish tank equipment.
Keep Aquarium Maintenance In Mind
You've got your tank setup and your aquascape looks fantastic! Everyone compliments you on how nice it looks and you're feeling really good.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - However, a week or two goes by and it's time for some routine fish tank maintenance tasks.
Namely, scraping the tank glass to get rid of some unsightly algae that is starting to grow on the front viewing panel of the tank.
But wait, aah man, I've put the rock too close to the front glass and I can't get the scraper in between the rock and the glass. Doh!
Another favorite task of many aquarists is gravel vacuuming. Yeah! Don't you just love vacuuming the gravel? Just kidding.
However, what must be done, must be done. It's time for another - doh! I've grouped too many of these plants together and it's going to be darn near impossible to effectively clean the gravel in that part of the tank.
Looks like the beginnings of a small nitrate factory in the making, which may be a big headache down the road.
The point here is that you want to aquascape effectively. Arrange the fish tank so that future tank maintenance tasks remain as easy and efficient as possible.
Aquarium ornaments
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Roman columns, the Parthenon, funny signs, the classic treasure chest or underwater diver that does double duty as a bubbler, small replica bridges, sunken ships, replica battleships, you name it.
The amount of available aquarium decor is vast. Kids almost unanimously get that small underwater diver in their first tank. You know the one.
It has a red diving suit and the bubble mask that is waving hello. It's almost like a right of passage of some sort.
Driftwood
Often seen in live plant setups, a nice piece of driftwood can be a great centerpiece of the aquascape in a freshwater tank. It Is about complete How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium.
Don't just pick any old piece of wood and place it into your tank. Get some from you local fish store and ask questions about the curing process.
To be on the safe side, you really need to monitor any wood in a separate quarantine tank and use your aquarium test kit to test the water parameters in the quarantine tank for several weeks or months before you can assume that it's safe to add to your main tank.
Rock
Just like driftwood, rocks can make nice additions to freshwater tanks. You sometimes see larger flat shaped rocks that can form ledges that provide hiding places for your fish.
A lot of African cichlid lovers really like Texas Holey rock because it contains limestone that slowly dissolves in the tank water increasing the buffering capacity.
Just like the driftwood, you will want to thoroughly clean any rock and quarantine it for several weeks/months before putting it into a display tank.
Fake Plants
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - The nice thing about fake plants is the ease of cleaning them. The bad thing about fake plants is that, well, they sometimes look really fake - especially when the base of the artificial plant pokes out of the substrate.
These can sometimes detract from the aquascape... but if done right, you can pull it off.
Live Plants
Live aquarium plants provide functionality as well as beauty. Nitrate removal, oxygenation, shelter and breeding sites are just some of the wonderful benefits of keeping live aquarium plants.
Live plants kept properly can help create some truly breathtaking, realistic looking aquarium scenes.
There are many live aquarium plants available each having differing lighting and supplement requirements. Research any live plants that you're interested in beforehand is the key.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Fake Coral or Dead Coral
Fake or Dead Coral will look nice (depends on who you ask) for a very short period of time in your aquascape and can be a major pain in the butt to clean and will make you wish you never shelled out the money for it.
Try the more natural route (live rock - see below) and avoid fake corals and dead coral skeletons altogether.
Live Corals
The ultimate aquarium decoration that is actually a living animal! Corals are not for the beginner and should be thoroughly researched beforehand because of their often hefty price tag and demanding water, lighting and feeding requirements.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - Live Rock
The great part about live rock, aside from the biological importance of using it, is that you can use aquarium silicon sealant to shape the rocks into any type of design you desire for your aquascape.
We now have a new term - "rockscaping". You can also use a drill to create small holes in the rock and use pvc pipes to hold them together to make columns or archways. The rockscaping possibilities are endless.
Another thing you'll probably need to do is place the rock directly on the tank bottom and not on top of the sand. Sand burrowing species could get injured or worse if you place the rock on top of the sand.
Here are some typical saltwater live rock layouts to help kick-start your creative genius.
Front View of Island Aquascape Design
Live Rock Island Aquascape
Front View of Slope Aquascape Design
Live Rock Slope Aquascape
Front View of Cove Aquascape
Live Rock Cove Aquascape
Aquarium Background
The tank's background can sometimes really set off the aquascaping in a tank. You have many options here. There are tons of ready-made tank backgrounds that are of picturesque nature scenes, coral reefs, etc.
Choose one that you like and one that won't clash with what's going to be in the tank.
Another option is to paint the outside back glass of the tank a solid color such as black, dark green, deep blue, slate blue, etc. Appliance spray paint sticks to the glass well.
Many hobbyists like painting the outside back glass better than using a tank background because you don't have to worry about water getting in between the background and the back glass. Believe me, it will happen and then it can be a pain to clean it. It's not as big a problem for freshwater tanks as it is for saltwater tanks.
In marine tanks, salt creep will eventually make its way in between the background and the glass causing unsightly salt creep on the glass.
How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium - More Cool Ideas
For more ideas and to get those creative juices flowing, it can be really helpful to check out what other hobbyists are doing.
Check out the fish tanks in the FishLore fish and aquarium picture gallery and the Your Fish Tank pages to get some ideas.
Once you get your tank set up, How to Aquascape Freshwater Aquarium, show it off by signing up to become a FishLore member (completely FREE) and you can then upload photos of your masterpiece. Have Fun!
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