I don't want to go through the hassle of having to have the right lighting for real plants, worrying about snails hitchhiking on my plants and having to have certain substrate and having to thin out and trim real plants.
I agree DQ. We've had tanks running for over 10 years and have never had a problem. When I did buy a few live plants they all died within 2 weeks and had dozens of baby snails that took FOREVER to get rid of. I'm sorry about your fish though veganchick.