Pothos and active substrate

[Sultrysamurai]

I have pothos with roots only in my aquarium. The leaves are out of the water. I’m reading conflicting advice. I have an active substrate ( contrasoil) and had caridinia shrimp. Are the pothos roots going to pull too much nutrients from my soil and ruin the buffering capabilities? 
the roots don’t touch the soil, but I’m not sure how it all works honestly. Thanks!

[cmo1922]

Hello! I see your question has gone unanswered so probably there is no good/clear answer to this as it seems like there are a lot of knowledgeable people on this forum.

I don't keep soft water shrimp, so I am not an expert here. However, I believe the buffering capacity of active substrates have a lot more to do with the kH of you water than the types of plants you have in the tank.

I have grown a lot of pothos in my tanks. In my experience they suck up a lot of nutrients like nitrates, which would be great for sensitive shrimp species. However, they may outcompete other plants in your tank for nutrients. For example in my tanks where I keep pothos I often struggle keeping nitrates above 5 ppm despite fertilizing at the recommended amounts. Eventually I tend to remove pothos as they start to affect growth of my other plants. I'm not sure if they would affect the buffering capacity of the substrate tho, even once they root deeply in them.

If it were me I would keep pothos in the tank especially if you don't plan on keeping a heavy plant load in there otherwise. But if you want to keep a lot of plants and especially if you don't plan on fertilizing much, you may need to consider removing it if you start seeing issues with nutrient deficiency in your other plants.

Good luck!

[Sultrysamurai]

On 2/10/2024 at 12:49 PM, cmo1922 said:

Hello! I see your question has gone unanswered so probably there is no good/clear answer to this as it seems like there are a lot of knowledgeable people on this forum.

I don't keep soft water shrimp, so I am not an expert here. However, I believe the buffering capacity of active substrates have a lot more to do with the kH of you water than the types of plants you have in the tank.

I have grown a lot of pothos in my tanks. In my experience they suck up a lot of nutrients like nitrates, which would be great for sensitive shrimp species. However, they may outcompete other plants in your tank for nutrients. For example in my tanks where I keep pothos I often struggle keeping nitrates above 5 ppm despite fertilizing at the recommended amounts. Eventually I tend to remove pothos as they start to affect growth of my other plants. I'm not sure if they would affect the buffering capacity of the substrate tho, even once they root deeply in them.

If it were me I would keep pothos in the tank especially if you don't plan on keeping a heavy plant load in there otherwise. But if you want to keep a lot of plants and especially if you don't plan on fertilizing much, you may need to consider removing it if you start seeing issues with nutrient deficiency in your other plants.

Good luck!

Thank you so much for your detailed response! This helps a lot, I will keep an eye on the other plants.