what's a good book for a noobie that
tells it all about setting up and maintaining
a planted aquarium? thanks for the replys.

Save your money! Anything you need to know about fish tanks is on this forum or one of the thousands of other forums on the web. Books are fine, but they are limited to the authors opinions and are not always the best way to do things. You can't ask a book questions and expect answers from them like you can here. What are you wanting to know about? Ask away.

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75 Gallon Planted

No idea about a book, but there are a lot of very experienced and knowledgeable people here who will help you on your way.

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"Being ignorant is not so much a Shame, as being unwilling to learn".-- Benjamin Franklin

thanks for the replys. i'm jumping and i need
to know everything. i'm buying a 55 gal aquarium.
i want live plants. it's going to be a fresh water tank.

There are some good books out there. Diane Walstad's, Ecology of the Planted Aquarium is referred to quite a bit in the planted world. Krystal Kasselman also has some books that are readily referred to as standards for running a planted tank. Amazon has all of these books.

Like they sad, use the forum, it contain a lot of opinions, not just one as the book.

Ok, jump already. You can do a lot with a 55. What are your first three questions? You can ask about a basic such as preferred substrate material for plants. You can establish your water params to know what fish and plants match it well enough. If you do not know what water params are, ask what the basic params you should test for are, you do not have to have a chem degree!.

Discussion of lighting for plants is important, and so is fertilization. A more basic decision would probably to decide if you want a low tech or hi tech tank to start, or maybe ask what a low tank/hi tech tank is.

A hint - searching forums will find many questions already answered.

Another hint: go to Google, type in like "aquarium water basic paramaters" or "fish tank hard water plants". Searching google is much more effective that all searches on forum as google is much smarter than the dumb search engines on the forums. You could even include "forum" as a search word but generally not necessary. You will also hit many other forums. [not knocking forums, just forum search engines]

Search and read instead of TV for about a week! You will convert your first three questions to 300 in no time!

Another point - although everyone means well, there are incorrect answers out there, and many correct answers to most questions.

Good Luck

You might look at places such as this Freshwater Fish: Freshwater Tropical Fish Species for Tropical Fish Tanks They provide a lot of information on fish, plants, and other habitants of the aquarium.

As to how to use all that info, that's what this site is for.

DLH

Anybody know if Takashi Amano has published anything?

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Officially fishless until after the move....tune in later for details!

Yeppers:

Amazon.com: Nature Aquarium World: How You Can Make A Most Beautiful Aquarium (9780793800896): Talsashi Amano: Books

I think he started the "natural" aquarium idea.

edit:

just read a review there and it stated that if you wanted to know how to setup these tanks you would be disappointed.

Dianna Walstad's book from what I hear is better at actual setup and techniques.

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fw leiden since 1979, fo salt since 1979, mixed reef 55g 2002-2009. Strong emphasis on the tank taking care of itself. Balanced with plant life, no water changes, tap water, no filters in FW. Only dosing calcium, alk, mag in marine reef tanks. http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/my-...ods-26410.html
recent tanks (till 2009) 7 years- 10g FW leiden 7 yrs, 55g mixed reef 7, 2 yrs, 20g FW leiden, 10 g fw leiden , 29g mixed reef, current tank 55g leiden

you might also take a look at this thread:

my (beaslbob build) methods

(i promise I won't tell anyone you looked at it. )

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fw leiden since 1979, fo salt since 1979, mixed reef 55g 2002-2009. Strong emphasis on the tank taking care of itself. Balanced with plant life, no water changes, tap water, no filters in FW. Only dosing calcium, alk, mag in marine reef tanks. http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/my-...ods-26410.html
recent tanks (till 2009) 7 years- 10g FW leiden 7 yrs, 55g mixed reef 7, 2 yrs, 20g FW leiden, 10 g fw leiden , 29g mixed reef, current tank 55g leiden

lol, anyone that thinks they can take an Amano book and use it for anything useful, obvioulsy hasn't seen the inside of one. Full of pictures and a glossary in the back. Doesn't have any detail in what he did. One section in the middle that may highlight one of the tanks he set up. Don't waste your money. You can get decent ideas from them from his hardscape ideas, but I find much more on plnted tank specific forums than his book. His tanks are all filtered, CO2, fertilized and get water changes. But, you'll likely get more from them than the thread linked above

Just last night talked to our old reef club's planted tank expert who knowa Amano. Appartently some of his very early books did discuss setup but the more recent ones were basiclaly aquascaping type info pictures.

She recommended Walstad's book as more of a how too.

my .02

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fw leiden since 1979, fo salt since 1979, mixed reef 55g 2002-2009. Strong emphasis on the tank taking care of itself. Balanced with plant life, no water changes, tap water, no filters in FW. Only dosing calcium, alk, mag in marine reef tanks. http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/my-...ods-26410.html
recent tanks (till 2009) 7 years- 10g FW leiden 7 yrs, 55g mixed reef 7, 2 yrs, 20g FW leiden, 10 g fw leiden , 29g mixed reef, current tank 55g leiden

I like Walstad's book, but I think it tries to go too much into detail - which is not needed for someone just starting out. Krystal Kasselman's book reads easier and she even has numerous layouts to try with plant name, placement, etc.. And also covers all the basics as well.