Desert, Bog, or something else? Have container, want garden.

[Fishkeeper]

I have a rubber stock tank that I tried to use as an indoor pond. It didn't look as cool as I thought it would, fish kept jumping out, and the water evaporated far too fast. I've re-homed all the fish, and now I'm trying to figure out what to do with the container. It's about four feet long, three feet wide, and a bit under two feet deep, so there's enough space for something pretty cool.
It's next to a west-facing second-story window, and I have a light that holds two F24T5/HO Bloom Spectrum bulbs, though I'm not certain what that means in terms of what the plants will think of it. It was sold to me for a dart frog vivarium that I no longer have, and those plants seemed to like it.
Now, I am not great with plants. I prefer plants where I can just set up a good habitat, get them established, and then let them do their thing. So my first thought was a desert garden. Big thick layer of pebbles on the bottom for drainage, some nice rich sandy soil on top, and a bunch of nice little desert plants.
My next thought was a bog garden. I could set it up with about ten inches of the tub sides above the soil to help hold in the humidity, and then I'd have a nice wet place for all sorts of cool plants and ferns. I'd rather not try to feed them any live foods, but I can give frozen (then thawed) mysis shrimp or similar to something like a pitcher plant that's simple to feed.

Does anyone have any suggestions? I like small plants that stay small without much pruning, and I'd rather have flowers with neat shapes than flowers with bright colors. I also like foliage and cool-looking plants. I can't have anything toxic, we have cats. I won't let the cats mess around in the garden and eat stuff, I usually keep them out of my room, but I don't want to risk them getting in and nibbling something.
The tub is right next to a 65g tank with a bunch of messy fish, so I can use what's essentially a mild manure tea on the garden. Thing is, we have a water softener, and all the faucets in the house are hooked up to it. Will that upset the plants? The fish are fine with it, and so are a number of aquatic plants, but I'm not sure about terrestrial plants.

So basically I'm looking for ideas for a small indoor garden of easy-to-keep plants. Does anyone have any general advice or suggestions for a habitat I could try?

 

[Becky]

Welcome to the forum!

I'm having trouble picturing this, do you have any photos? Does it have any drainage?

 

[Fishkeeper]

Thanks, glad to be here!
I don't have any photos, and there isn't really much to see anyway. It's just a big rubber tub, like a Rubbermaid tub but shallower and oval-shaped. It's the kind of thing one might bury in the ground and use as a container pond. It doesn't have any drainage, no, which is why I thought bog plants might be a better idea than something that would get upset about any retained water.

 

[Becky]

Ah ok I see what you mean now. I like the sound of a desert garden - you could have cacti and succulents, it could look really lovely! A bog could also work well, but I'd worry about the potential for it to smell. Where abouts in your house will this be?

 

[Fishkeeper]

This is actually going to be in my bedroom, so I would prefer to keep bad smells to a minimum. I like how mud, peat, and wet plants smell, though.
As a general rule, which type of container garden would be harder to kill?

 

[Vishu1708]

I'd go with big garden......plants like dwarf papyrus, umbrella sedge, emerged Amazon swords, Taro's etc would look really cool!!