I do not plant the tank, instead I have numerous pots in my tank. When I start a new pot I use one without holes in the bottom so all material is retained when removing from the tank later.
First in the pot is fertiliser, usually phostrogen followed by peat based compost and then top off with tank gravel. I grow cryptos and the growth rate is very good.
The reason I started doing this was that I use under gravel filtration and plants do not do as well as in the pots.
The young BNs love grazing on the leaves.
Fortyfoot
:hi: