# Planting a HOB Filter



## sonicninja (18 Mar 2018)

Hi everyone,
I have an Eheim Liberty HOB filter and I wonder if anyone can give me any advice on planting emmersed plants in it? Its currently just filled with ceramic rings so I dont know if this is sufficient for the plants to root on or not. Secondly do I have to provide any level of humidity or will certain plants just grow outside of the aquarium if given sufficient light and water?

Any suggestions would be great. I do have some brazilian pennywort growing in the aquarium that Im considering ripping out so i wonder if this would be a good plant to try?

Cheers everyone!

Keith


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## dw1305 (18 Mar 2018)

Hi all, 





sonicninja said:


> I do have some brazilian pennywort growing in the aquarium that Im considering ripping out so i wonder if this would be a good plant to try?


Should be fine. Ceramic rings work as well as any other physical support. 

You could try a _Spathiphyllum _they are cheap to buy as small house plants.  Have a look at <"Best terrestrial....">.

cheers Darrel


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## zozo (18 Mar 2018)

Depending on the HOB filters dimension, sponge can be used. For example i planted a small Chamaedorea in the hob and used 3 smaller pieces of filter sponge 2 coarse and 1 fine, obviously the water hits the coarse piece first. The plant is between the 2 coarse sponges, the roots will finaly penetrate into the sponge. I can take the plant out complete with sponges and clean it under the tap and put it back without damaging it..


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## Macman6 (19 Mar 2018)

i have just started growing Emersed, most aquatic plants grow emersed... i have lobelia Cardinalis growing well as well as Lileaopsis Braziliensis.

with terrestrial plants don't be scared to use a big cutting, i have gone too small so far and they struggle as its hard to stop them getting their Rhizome wet at a small size. (i think that's why i'm struggling anyway) only my pilea cadierei has taken hold so far and i'm trying a larger anthurium at the moment


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## sonicninja (19 Mar 2018)

Thanks everyone! I’ve stuck the Brazilian pennywort in there and some ludwigia. I’m going to start with some dainty plants before trying more substantial houseplants which might make my nano tank look a little small


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro


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## sciencefiction (19 Mar 2018)

One thing I've noticed about growing emersed plants is that the medium they're planted in can become anaerobic. It doesn't seem to bother the plants themselves but obviously that's not a good thing in a filter. Emersed plants grow very big and dense root systems, especially dense if in a small planter. .Having that experience in mind, although I do have water running over the planter baskets directly from filter outlets, I would not plant a filter...not unless you have a back up filter/main filtration.

I had to take down a leaking tank once, so I took the emersed plants apart as well. The roots of my palm(similar to zozo's picture above) stunk of hydrogen sulphate when I took them out of the riparium planter. I was surprised because the plant actually was doing rather well.


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