John, it's not as easy as keeping flowerhorns or even an arrowana... trust me. It's lotsa work and lots of understanding the science behind it all.

Ideally, you will need a CO2 injector, a CO2 reactor (Yes, you need to pump in a supply of CO2 to grow plants underwater well. Fish breathing/respiration is not enough CO2 for plants). this CO2 injector you can make it cheap, cheap DIY. U will need to inject CO2 if you're going to have any success planting in the aquarium really.

visit: http://www.nfis.com/~hartland/aqua/co2.htm
or : http://www.qsl.net/w2wdx/aquaria/diyco2.html

Then you must have enough lighting. U will need lots of lighting and lighting of the right spectrum (ie lights that will grow plants). The recommended is between 2.5W-3W per gallon (or approx 3.75L) of water. In a 3ft aquarium, you'll need about 4 tubes of flourescent lights to get to that level. (SSHEESH! THat's a lot of lighting.... )

Then you must have plant substrate for the roots to grow. I use a mixture of laterite (red sticky earth) and my favourite.... Cat litter (calcium bentonite) mixed and placed under the gravel. The gravel bed should be no less than 2.5 inches thick. 1/2 inch lateriate mix and 2inch small size gravel over the top.

Then your filter must be under water (powerfilter for small tanks, canisters for bigger tanks), and you cannot use the box filter because it creates too much turbulance at the water surface and that releases all the precious CO2 that you have pumped in! U must keep the water surface very still.

Then when you plant the plants, you cannot plant one at a time... must plant the whole tank at one go. At least 2/3 of the surface of the gravel must be planted at one go or you will have lots of algae problems. (The higher plants that you plant must outcompete the algae for food and win or else the water will just be full of stringy algae.)

There's lots more to know and learn, but I'll stop here..

Plants will grown lush and beautiful and u will need to prune every week.

Dr Tan, any interest in getting a planted tank set up like that at Zen WG office? It can cost quite a bit if you buy all the propper equipment, but hey, I'm always on a budget..... do everything on the cheap... and it still gets results.

.... ok, I'm digressing from the Flowerhorn and cichlid discussion... maybe this thread should be moved...... somewhere. Don't know where though.