PaddyC's Peaceful Community

I think it looks like Cordyline Australis...?

Well I must say my first plant purchase is working out great so far!!

Your planting looks good Paddyc, and not too deep - the swords will do excellently with your substrate.  Not sure about the species of plant with the red edges, if the 'stems' are quite thick, I suspect Sue may be right, it may not really grow, just 'survive' in the tank as such, but it won't do any harm to wait and see, alternatively you could take the opportunity to replace it whilst you are fish free - I'd stick with something red, I like this look. 

The swords will indeed grow tall and 'wide' as they relax into their new setting and grow new leaves at shallower angles to the substrate, I think you are in a good place for now though - see what happens, what grows and what doesn't and tweak things as they do, were not talking about plants that will take over the tank in a few weeks time here by any means.  I quite like the look you have especially with the bubble wall as you will find the swords interrupt the upward flow of bubbles and create interesting patterns at the back of your tank; this and a dense lush background of swords will look very nice I'm sure.

Black is by far the best option, others look good in shops only for some stupid reason imo.

The more you describe those plants the more I'm with Sue but as previous, you don't need to panic right now, perhaps take the view of wait to see when something catches your eyes in the shops.  There are two fantastic videos on YouTube by MassAquariums both entitled 5 aquarium plants for beginners (10 in total!) that give a nice introduction to things if you want - well worth a watch imo - he will get much faster growth with his set up than you should expect though!

I have to say I think Sue's right that isn't an aquatic plant.

It happened to me too when I was buying for the kids tank.

It really annoys me that these are sold as aquatic plants when all they'll do is slowly die when submerged.

The one I bought melted quite quickly and made a right mess
I Googled it and realised I'd been sold a Hypoestes, commonly called the polka dot plant,
I took it back and complained and they exchanged it for some true aquatic plants.

The problem with red aquatic plants is that they often need high light in order to remain red.
And then, in high light situations, you tend to need to inject COČ.

I have a plant in my tank, green with red edges and it's doing really well. I don't know the name but it's one of our favourites.
I'll try and get a photo over the weekend and then someone might be able to help identify it.

Do you recommend buying some tools for looking after the aquascaping? I have seen the post about the tweezer set, I might invest, but also think it would be better to have a dedicated pair of trimers/scissors

Take a look at this set of long tweezers, curved tweezers and curved scissors.


That last photo on the bridge camera looks great!

The tank looks really nice Paddy  I've had a good look at that red leafed plant its definitely not a cordyline, it could be a dracena. Don't feel to bad about it btw, I did the same thing when I started  The plant is growing on the kitchen windowsill now. There are actually quite a few terrestrial plants sold in the aquarium trade, I always ask if I'm not sure.

... As with gardens, the best looking aquaria are those with a relatively small range of plants, each in a group, rather than small numbers of many different species, which always looks like a dog's dinner.

Oops.

But then I quite like my dog's dinner Jungle. 

Only 8 miles! My favourite shop is 18 miles away 

Definitely. They didn't sell you something knowing it would die which a lot of shops would have done. Well worth going back there.

Just got my new tank before birthday. How do you change the name of a topic?