# Glosso in Sand



## target

I am thinking of growing a carpet of glosso in my 90g when I get it running. I am planning to use sand as the substrate. I will have fairly high light (4xhagen GLO T5 54W) and will be EI dosing.

My question is, has anyone else had good results growing glosso in a sand substrate? I don't want to use anything but the sand as I want the white bottom look where the carpet won't be. I just want to know if I'd be wasting my money buying the glosso.

Thanks


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## taureandragon76

I have grown quite a few plants in sand without any problems. I am just wondering if your gonna be able to grow a nice carpet of glosso without co2


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## target

Co2 might be in the plans as well. Just not right from the get go as the funds are limited right now. LOL Should have mentioned I will be using metricide as well. Not the same, I know but it should help.


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## neven

taureandragon76 said:


> I have grown quite a few plants in sand without any problems. I am just wondering if your gonna be able to grow a nice carpet of glosso without co2


I use tahitian moon sand, which is sand that is black, nothing special about it, inert like other common tank sands. Also i do not inject CO2 and it still grows like stink. On top of that i am using 2 twister 21 watt cfls horizontally on a 29 gallon, so less than 2 watts per gallon.

What i am doing though is typical EI dosage pretty close to the target parameters recommended, and metricide dosing.

Several members on the board here have had glosso from my tank and i've not had any complaints about its health.

off topic, but plant databases are a bit outdated with the shift towards excel overdoing/metricide usage as being an accepted method. Many high light required plants are just high co2 demand (which coincidentally was used with High light), and im finding quite a few Intense red species are almost just intense in medium/low light with the metricide dosing, there's exceptions as always, but i figured i'd put my two cents in on this topic.


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## nmullens

It would't take long to pay off a co2 setup with the amount of money spent dosing matricide in a 90 and Matricide is poisonous to fish when over dosing. With the amount of light you have I would say co2 is a must for a nice carpet of Glosso. IMO

Most tanks you seen in aquascaping pictures that have sections of white sand only areas to look like a beach or a stream. That has been done using some type of divider to separate the high nutrient substrate with the plants from the white sand. Using a high nutrient substrait is also a good plan, it all depends on your goals. This can be done cheep IE: DIY worm castings under your sand.


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## neven

It is not as poisonous as some make it out to be, i've had deaths from it due to stupidity or a risk i knew i was taking, by doing a very high overdose regime to give an outbreak a huge punch, thats it. Others on this forum and planted tank have maintained livestock full life term, functioning fine. With moderate overdoses i've kept shrimp, various tetra's, snails, Bristlenose, guppies and oto cats.

for larger tanks its more of a waste, but it takes time for many to save for a co2 system and a jug of metricide should tide that time over.


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## target

Thanks for the responses guys. I know metricide can be dangerous but I always used it in low amounts. Adding Co2 is definitely in the cards, but i will finish off the metricide first. 

nmullens, where do you get worm casings? i have heard about them a few times, just never known where to pick them up.


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## tang daddy

I grew glosso, ug in a shrimp tank long ago with black gravel and white sand


















I know it doesnt show but eventually it made it to the sand!


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## 2wheelsx2

The light limiting thing is pretty much past tense now. Most people with experience are going back to medium light setups and CO2/metricide. Outside of the cost/toxicity, the main thing with CO2 is flexibility. You can grow more plants and change things faster than with Metricide/Excel. The big thing with metricide/Excel is the algacide aspect. Many CO2 users still use limited amounts of Excel for that aspect. As with anything, it's always pay now or pay later. CO2 you pay up front, Metricide you pay on the back end. Either way you still pay. And for people with bigger tanks, the expense of a CO2 setup is miniscule compared to the cost of the other equipment and fish.

Then there's also the flip side where many fishes (like higher temperature fish such as discus and some plecos) don't tolerate CO2 injection as well, so you have no choice but to use something else or nothing at all and only go low light. It all depends on your priority. However, based on the examples here, I think it's pretty conclusive that Glosso can be grown successfully in sand. The rate of propagating may be more of a concern if you have cories and plecos which would disturb the substrate. I know Tom Barr said he gave up HC and went to Staurogyne in his tanks with plecos for that reason.


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## tang daddy

I forgot to add that if you have fish that dig then the Glosso in sand is a no go but otherwise you don't even need co2 mine grew like a weed from the lack of water changes!!


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## target

Well, I was planning to have a collection of smaller plecos, and some sterbai, so I guess glosso is probably a no go then.


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