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Plant Filter: Yes Igor, Dr. Frankenfish is at it again! ;-)



> Date: Mon, 12 Jan 1998 01:46:21 -0800
> From: Walter & Jeanne Klockers <klock at olynet_com>
> 
[Good description of "floating plant filter" deleted.]

> I'm making this post for a couple of reasons: 1) IMHO it would be good
> for the archives to have a reference for plant filters, and; 2) To see
> if anybody can give me some advice on how I might achieve long-term
> success with these plants. This was a *very enjoyable* project! I had a
> great deal of fun "messing around with ideas" and bouncing them off you
> folks on the APD and some fellow fish friends. Thanks to all! Special
> thanks to Jeff Dietsch for all his help. :-)

The important thing to keep this working is to keep the plants growing.
They mostly take up nitrogen and phosphate for growth.  So try to use
fast growing plants and thin them out frequently so they will keep in
active growth.

I use floating plants on my fry and grow-out tanks to keep the water
quality up despite heavy feeding.  I use Limnobium (frogbit), duckweed
and water sprite (Ceratopteris) as well as hornwort.  If you use plants
that your LFS will take back for credit, you can get an awful lot of
free stuff - this past year I've gotten 3 volumes of Baensch, a filter
and a heater and lots of frozen food, etc from a few square feet of
frogbit.  It's beyond me who is buying all this frogbit and not getting
overrun with it themselves!

Another thing you might want to try in your filter is hydroponic lettuce.
Salads for you and pesticide-free greens for your fish!