New Plant Preparation for tank

[meganmcnerney]

I've seen many posts about how to prepare and clean your tank, but I can't find the threads about preparing your living plants to be put into the habitat. I plan to keep my plants in a container for easy cleaning in the future....how do I clean my new pothos before placing in the tank?

[LilyPad]

Everyone kind of has their own way of doing it. What I do...

Take the plant out of the original pot, rinse the leaves off under running water and wash all the dirt from the roots (fertilizers and pesticides are usually in the dirt) Then I clean the pot. Then I plant the plant back in the original moss using substrate out of my tank. I usually leave the plant outside then for a couple of days (though that wont happen in winter), rinse the leaves again, take it out of the pot and plant it in the tank.

I know you can wash the leaves with a bleach solution too, someone should have more advice about that technique.

[ViperJr]

You could also set it in a clean pot and hide the pot in the substrate. It will not create an equally good ecosystem if you want to achive that with springtails etc., but it's eaiser to water (if you plan on water by hand) and do maintenence and replacing if needed.

[Lynx]

I do the same as Amy. They're doing great, but I'm not sure what I'm going to do when I have to break the viv down. I also have a couple still in their pots after the aforementioned procedure, but semi-concealed by branches with one, and the other on its side behind a mound of substrate. It's an ivy, so it worked out quite nicely

[LilyPad]

Heather...I've already broken down 2 planted vivs. It is really easy actually. I replanted them in a new viv without a problem.