Table of Contents
What are silk plants?
Silk plants are artificial plants that are made of a kind of fiber that is primarily spun by “silk worms”. In many cases just like plastic plants these are made from a kind of polyesters, polymers and plastics as well.
However silk plants that are used in aquariums are better than plastic plants. Silk plant is a great choice for using in a fish tank because of their soft texture which makes them practically less harmful for delicate fish skin.
Why use silk plants when you can use plastic plants?
If you look closely, silk plants and plastic plants look the same but there is a fundamental difference in both of them and that’s their base material. Most people still go for plastic plants because they are easily available to buy, are very inexpensive and hundreds of designs are available.
However from fish health point of view, plastic plants can harm your fish fins. Plastic plants can have sharp edges that can make a cut on delicate fish skin and this can lead to infections. Many of such infections can be even contagious and that’s why you can chose “silk plants” instead of plastic plants. Silk plants are slightly expensive as compared to plastic plants but you need to buy them just once and save precious life from spoiling too.
Another problem with plastic plants is that they become a base for algae growth as well. Algae is not bad for fish but when it’s goes out of control, the entire tank becomes greenish losing it’s visual beauty.
Some fish tend to eat algae that sit of plastic plant leaves and due to their sharp edges it can harm their body parts. Having plastic plant in a fish tank has this only downside of safety for the delicate fish.
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Why use silk plants when you can get live plants?
Yes, no matter how much you appreciate silk plants they cannot be compared to live plants. However having a live planted tank has a big learning curve and for a beginner this can be big investment of time and money.
Silk plants give the same visual feel of a live planted tank with fraction of cost and also give him freedom from all the maintenance that is required to keep a live planted tank thriving and healthy.
When you have live plants there comes the investment of extra lighting, pressurized CO2 injection system (optional) and managing soil with nutrients for healthy plant living. All these require time and months to get the entire ecosystem flourish in your tank.
Even when a planted tank gives plenty of benefits from health point of view for the fish, many people will prefer to go for silk plants to start with just for this reason.
Do silk plants harm fish?
Both plastic and silk plants won’t harm fish. However while buying plastic plants you must check their design and overall build quality. Sometimes plastic plants tend to have sharp edges and these can definitely tear fish fins and causing injury. Once fish get injured by any means it becomes difficult to treat them.
Because of this quality of plastic plants, silk plants have been designed that look exactly like live plants but are artificial plants and at the same time totally eliminate the hazard of any physical injury to fish while swimming in the tank.
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Which one are better, silk or plastic plants?
If you want to compare silk and plastic plants then silk plants are always better then plastic plants. Here are some awesome things about silk plants
- Just like live plants silk plants sway to water currents inside water column and feel just like live plants. Plastic plants on the other hand tend to be stiff in the water
- Silk plants are practically harmless to fish but plastic plants can have sharp edges that can tear fish fins causing physical damage.
- Silk plants are little expensive than plastic plants but this one time investment is must if you are concerned about fish safety and health.
How to identify silk plant vs plastic plants?
You can identify silk plants and plastic plants by touching them. Plastic plants sometimes have slightly rough and a stiff finish as compared to silk ones. This stiffness is what can cause harm to delicate fish skin and therefore many fish keepers prefer silk plants over plastic ones.
The big problem with plastic plants is that many times these are of cheap quality. Many people buy these to save money because these are extremely cheap in quality as well as price.
But the issue is that being of poor quality in due course of time these plants start losing their paint and when this happens the water quality is likely to become toxic. No one knows what kind of paint is being used to apply color on these plastic plants and whether that paint is safe for fish or not.
It’s better to stay away from plastic plants just for this reason. Most of the times the build quality of these is poor as well that can cause physical damage to fish too.
Is it ok to have silk plants instead of live plants?
Many people in the aquarium hobby are afraid to share the fact that they don’t have live plants in their tank because of they think they will be trolled online or by other experts in the community.
However it’s not a big surprise because having live plants have many obvious biological advantages over silk, plastic or artificial plants. Live plants easily consume all the toxic gases and when the perfect ecosystem is established the tank becomes the healthiest one with minimum cleaning and maintenance.
However having live plants in your tank requires a learning curve and can be time consuming. That is why many beginners prefer to have silk plants initially to visually build a quality to their tank. Which is I think a better solution than having live plants till you acquire good knowledge of the subject.
Live plants will require good knowledge of lighting, pressurized CO2 injection and nutrients for the plant growth. Also there are no perfect answers to how to go about it because the environment of every tank will be different and there will be lots of trials and errors (and probably fish deaths) before the system gets perfected.
Silk plants will never harm your fish but the only downside is that they will not provide any biological benefit for fish health.
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Things to consider while picking up fake plants?
The problem with fake plants is that many times the plastic ones are made that are not at all a replica of the species found in the natural world and when put in the tank they look quite ugly.
For example many times you’ll get fake plants in ugly bluish colors with sharp edges. Plants with such shades do not exist underwater and they make your tank look really ugly.
If at all you want to buy fake plants make sure that there exist an actual real species of that in the natural world so that they look as close as to the original one.
Precautions to take while buying silk plants
Many silk plants have a kind of plastic mesh at the bottom of them on which the entire plants stand. This is particularly true when you have a ground cover like plant species in silk format.
When you lay this at the bottom all you have to do is cover it will gravel and hide the bottom supporting plastic mesh so that plants look rooted above the gravel. This really looks cool in the tank.
However the downside of this is that all the uneaten fish food particles, fish solid waste (poop), other solid particles if any get suck under the plastic supporting mesh and start to decay.
The thicker the gravel bed the difficult it becomes to clean and suck out this debris from the ground of the fish tank floor making it a big problem for fish health. If this debris is not sucked out it is going to start turning into ammonia sooner making your tank water a toxic chamber.
A better way to use the silk ground cover species is to tie them to some object like a stone surface or a driftwood surface vertically so that solid debris can fall down in the gravel because of gravity and it is always easier to clean the gravel that the gravel with fake plants rooted it together.
Can fish destroy or eat silk/plastic (fake) plants?
Obviously fish will not eat plastic plants but many times algae will grow on fake plants and fish will try to eat that sometimes. The “Silver Dollar Fish” will also eat live plants in the tank. Some fish species are well known as algae eaters and no matter where it grows fish will eat that.
Fake plants don’t provide any biological advantage in a tank like live plant and for this reason they can be avoided. But if you want to go for fake plants then pick ones that are of high quality from a trusted seller.
From where can I buy silk plants for aquariums online?
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