Java Fern/Moss

On 2006-02-09, PiperJason wrote:

To top off my frustration, I have algae on all sides of the tank. I
only feed the fish a bit in the morning and at night, and he eats all I
give him in under a minute... Any advice is greatly apprechiated.


I have java moss and java fern in my 1G betta tank. I also have pothos
and bamboo growing out of if. The lighting is natural sunlight through
the windows and the room light in the evenings. I never change the water.
Just add more water when it evaporates. The java moss grows out of
control and the fern reproduces amazingly well. I couldn't get either
plant to grow in my "plant" tanks.


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In article , js1 wrote:
On 2006-02-09, PiperJason wrote:

To top off my frustration, I have algae on all sides of the tank. I
only feed the fish a bit in the morning and at night, and he eats all I
give him in under a minute... Any advice is greatly apprechiated.


I have java moss and java fern in my 1G betta tank. I also have pothos
and bamboo growing out of if. The lighting is natural sunlight through
the windows and the room light in the evenings. I never change the water.
Just add more water when it evaporates. The java moss grows out of
control and the fern reproduces amazingly well. I couldn't get either
plant to grow in my "plant" tanks.

Rule 1 of algae control: any tanks that is 50% java moss will
never have any algae.

I've tried many things for as low as maintenance betta "jars"
and after playing with many a shoot, stalk, clump and who knows what
else, moss of any kind is the inevitabe winner. To the point where
one can assert that the recipe to keen any non annual killi in perpetuity
is to simply fill a 20, half fill it with java moss and let it get some
light; feeding is actually optional if you don't mind small numbers of fish -
the more food you add the more fry you get to scoop out.

Nah, moss is the single most usefull aquarium plant IMO. When I was
having trouble growing nothing but crypts and having some algae problem
Tom Barr told me to "add fast growing plants and fertilize" and I tried
many things. Stem plants were ok, but moss and flaoting plants worked,
each by themselves and togteher.

Water lettuce turns out to be a relly nice covering btw, it dwarfs and makes
1" plants. I have scads of them and should post a pic. Soon..





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"low light plants"like mosses, ferns Java, Anubias and Cryptocorynes all the growth in low light. However, all of them in the wild sun, do better - so spectacular - and more light.