Plants saved after trimming tank, how to make them last

[cemantic]

I just trimmed my tank yesterday and have five pails full of different plants. 

Any advice from anyone reading this on how long you can keep plants in pails?  Anything you can add to help them last longer?

I have been feeling guilty about just throwing them out and this sunday I ripped out about a third of the plants in the tank.

There is a two and a half tall foot sword that takes up about 1/3 of the tank.  Interesting the way they propagate.  It grows branches and then at each branch a new little sword starts growing.

Sorry I have never really identified the plants.  There are five different plants.  red veined ones when matured, long string one the similar to an onion plant, 20- 30 swords ranging in size from 1-2 inches up to 5-6 inches,  ...

[fischkopp]

It kind of depends on the plants. The biggest problem with buckets is to get light to the plants. So, plants that aren't very light demanding (swords, crypts, fern, ...) can last a couple of days. Any plant coming that requires high light will likely be gone or at least suffer after a day.