Hello, you did not mention about guarantine for yr newly bought GF. Not advisable to put newly bought fish into main tank. Find from the web on how to guarantine the fish.
It's OK to have more than one filter system, so suggest you use both and see if you can tie the plants to driftwood. Remove all sands but take out the fishes before you do that or all the dirts will kill the fishes.
Did you use aged water or add anti-chorine to new water.
