[Pothos ruined my tank?]

I started my planted tank in October 2020 with about an inch of organic garden soil topped with an inch of gravel. I planted dwarf sagittaria, Nymphoides hydrophylla 'Taiwan' and water sprite. There were some random red leaves so I planted them too not expecting much and they all grew wonderfully. I had 3 big beautiful red plants and a thriving planted tank.

Then I got this idea that having a little pothos plant growing from the hang on back filter canister would look lovely. And it did. However, the plants in my aquarium started getting yellow spots and holes, losing leaves and just melting. The red plants are now just stems.

I did a little research then, took the pothos out, and started adding Seachem Potassium supplement. It's been about 3 weeks since I started with this, but the plants are not looking any better.

What can I do to save my plants?

[Adding schooling fish to a new aquarium - a few at a time?]

They didn't have any more CPD's, but they said they should get them in 2-3 weeks. Instead I got more plants and 3 platies. Both of the females gave birth a couple of days apart, so now I have a lot of babies hiding in the plants. The CPD's were super shy and didn't even come out to eat much for the first two weeks while they were alone. But since the platies came, they've been much more lively, staying out in the open, swimming around, chasing food. Even their color improved dramatically. They were almost transparent when I got them, but now it's easy to see the lovely pearl pattern.

I'll add 4-6 more CPD's and I think that'll be that for my tank. I'll let it all grow and settle.

[Adding schooling fish to a new aquarium - a few at a time?]

No fertilizer, but I have an inch of garden soil under an inch of gravel for the substrate.

I'll add 2-3 more fish and keep testing to make sure it's all going well.

[Adding schooling fish to a new aquarium - a few at a time?]

1 hour ago, Mitch Norton said:

You want 0 Ammonia and NO2, but to be cycled and starting to “season” you want to see some nitrates. Did you just do a water change? Some nitrates means your cycle is working. If it were me I would wait to see that I am regularly producing nitrates, but sounds like it is going well!

This was tested after the lights were on for a few hours. Could it be that the plants used up all of the available nitrates? It's been 5 days since the last water change and the nitrates went down on their own since then. 

[Adding schooling fish to a new aquarium - a few at a time?]

It's been almost two weeks. The two CPD's are doing great. They were shy in the beginning, staying mostly in the corner under the HOB filter, but I see them going out and exploring the rest of the tank more now, I think they are both males. 

On October 17, I had NO3 of 50 mg/l and NO2 of 3 mg/l.
On October 18, NO3 dropped to 25 mg/l and NO2 stayed at 3 mg/l. I topped off the aquarium with some bottled spring water. 
On October 21, NO3 was 25 mg/l and NO2 was 1 mg/l. I changed about 25% with tap water treated with Seachem Prime. Water was tested before changing. 
On October 22, NO3 was 20 mg/l and NO2 was 1 mg/l. 

I tested again today and NO3 and NO2 are both at 0 mg/l. I tested ammonia throughout and it was always at 0.

Does this mean my tank is cycled? It was started on October 1st with a lot of plants (which likely had some bacteria on them, along with bladder snails) which are growing really well now after some of the original leaves melted.

Can I add more fish? If I can't find more CPD's since they seem to be pretty rare here, would adding some other type of Danio help the first two feel less lonely? Or some white clouds? 

Thanks!
 

[Help me identify these two plants]

These came with some other plants and I planted them just to see if they'll grow. It looks like they're doing well, growing roots and even new stems, so I'm wondering what they are.

[Adding schooling fish to a new aquarium - a few at a time?]

Thanks everyone! I went to the store (another city, long drive, went there on another errand), and they didn't have glowlight danios nor white clouds, but they had two leftover CPD's so I got them both. I'll be making another trip in two weeks. Should I get one or two more then (if they have them) or just wait for a while until the tank gets more established?

[Adding schooling fish to a new aquarium - a few at a time?]

I see recommendations to add only one or a few fish to a new aquarium because the cycling may still be going on, but also when adding schooling fish it's recommended to add at least 6, preferably more.

I have a 17 gallon planted tank that I've set up almost 2 weeks ago. Some of the plants melted at first, but are now coming back and growing really well. I wasn't adding ammonia, because I figured the decaying plants would serve that purpose. There are also bladder snails and they are growing and multiplying.

I've done one water change so far of maybe 10%. My test strip gave me these results a couple of hours after:

• NO3 - 10-25 mg/l
• NO2 - 1
• GH - 4 degrees
• KH - 20 degrees
• pH - 8
• Cl2 - 0

I'm going to add some minerals before I add fish to raise GH. Should I be doing anything else?

I would like to keep glowlight danios or white clouds. When and how should I add them to the tank? Do I wait another 4-6 weeks and then add them all at once?

[Hello from Serbia]

Hi all!

I'm new here and new to the hobby. My 2yo daughter likes fish, so I figured I could get a bowl with a guppy or something. How hard can it be? But I had a feeling the pet store wouldn't give me the best info. Then I went down the YouTube rabbit hole and now I'm here with a 17 gallon planted tank and no fish yet. We do have a few bladder snails though which are pretty cute.