what plants to use for cyling for a riccia carpet tank?

[naresh666]

i am going to have a riccia only carpet. thus i dun have ferts in my substrate,

i would like to know what plants i can get to cycle my tank before starting with the riccia?

[alyosha]

There is no reason to cycle plant only tanks, ammonia is a nutrient for plants, and nitrites pose no danger (it is a toxin for fish, messing with hemoglobine). So just grow your riccia form day one, remove clorine.

[biweilow]

not true. high ammonia and nitrate levels bring out all sorts of algae problems.

[alyosha]

What is not true? Your point being what exactly? Cycling of the tank will happen eventually if you donot intorduce chlorine and there is sufficient surface and temperature and ph for the nitrogen converting bacteria to grow. However you do not need to wait for the tank to cycle to start enjoy plants in a new aquarium, cause the major toxins druing cycling - ammonia and nitrite do not harm plants, and are in fact nutrients for plants. As for algae problems, they are proven to be not the result of ammonia and nitrate, but of disbalance of nutrients and light conditions. In any case whast the point, what is not true?

[valice]

Naresh, you don't need to cycle a tank before you start planting. But you will need to cycle the tank if you are going to add livestock.

Just plant all the plants you going to put into the tank and fill up water. The ammonia and nitrate is not an issue with livestock and shouldn't be a major issue in a planted tank. Cycling is always necessary due to the spike in nitrite and ammonia when the beneficial bacteria is still building up.

Actually alyosha, it has also been proven that an ammonia buildup in dead spots will result in algae growing in those places as well.

[Simon]

please read this writeup

http://fins.actwin.com/mirror/begin-cycling.html
http://www.aquahobby.com/articles/e_fishless.php

[alyosha]

Naresh, you don't need to cycle a tank before you start planting. But you will need to cycle the tank if you are going to add livestock.

Just plant all the plants you going to put into the tank and fill up water. The ammonia and nitrate is not an issue with livestock and shouldn't be a major issue in a planted tank. Cycling is always necessary due to the spike in nitrite and ammonia when the beneficial bacteria is still building up.

Actually alyosha, it has also been proven that an ammonia buildup in dead spots will result in algae growing in those places as well.

Nice pics in signiture, point me to the research about ammonia? I have cycled several tanks, adding up to 6ppm ammonia raw, and barely got some greenish algae after three weeks of doing it Can you gorw algae cosnistently with ammonia? This doesnt contradict the statement that it is a disbalance of nutrietns, not just specific presence of ammonia, which causes algae, thats the consensus , as far as I know.

[Puffer]

i am going to have a riccia only carpet. thus i dun have ferts in my substrate,

i would like to know what plants i can get to cycle my tank before starting with the riccia?

Hello naresh666,
I take it that you are adding some livestock into the tank. You would need to then cycle the tank well, especially if you are adding in more sensitive types or critters. I have some floating plants, hornworts and hygrophila deformis (water wisteria) which are known to be fast absorbers of nutrients. Let me know if you want them. FOC.

[torque6]

cycling can also be done with plants, just add any beneficial bateria to kick start the process from day 1. API/sechem offers some non-refigerated bb.