Plant ideas?

[sfsamm]

@SueD once again you nailed it. Hygrophila is definitely the bamboo thing I was trying to describe above. THANK YOU! I'm happy to see there are several varieties too, Corymbosa was what I had noticed.
@BluewaterBoof the repens is an option to try, my sister has a bunch maybe I can get a few testers from her. Don't know if they will stand up to the bulldozers when they fly through they seem so dainty lol but free makes it an easy one to try. I was under the impression that she was keeping it short intentionally I didn't realize it was one that tended to stay shorter.

The synos are currently ranging in size from I try not to guess because it's huge (at least 7") and the smallest over 4". It's not that they rummage around so much as they annihilate anything green in their path during nighttime fish games... They just run into and over stuff tearing off leaves and shearing stems as they go. Crypts, anubias, crinum all survive well enough, hopefully solving Mg will get swords going I think they should live through the stampeding.

[angelcraze2]

IME....I have never had a Mg deficiency with swords, hate to tell you after all that Internet loopholing....and my gh is 2 in my 120g with like 12 amazon swords. But I can help you with growing swords.

Are we talking amazon sword? They are very very heavy feeders. That's why I provide a dirt substrate for them, they LoVe soil! But you could use any nutrient-rich planting medium or even try root tabs. Honestly, I have very soft water, 105 TDS on average and my A. swords area healthy. They use mostly nutrients thru their roots IME.

Try to get those swords anchored one way or another, then add root tabs under the plant. Or try planting them in a heavy dish (so they won't float up) with nutrient-rich substrate and bury the dish.

Just try not to bury the base of the plant too much, I give a final gentle pull upwards when I'm done planting to keep the base above the substrate (roots in the nutrients).

If you're talking about other sword types, like chain swords, than nevermind, but I've grown those too in very soft water when breeding my EB rams.

Are your fish ok with epsom salts added? They might prefer softer water.

[BluewaterBoof]

I was under the impression that she was keeping it short intentionally I didn't realize it was one that tended to stay shorter.

Oh yes, quite short. The stronger the light, the more compact they grow.

Here is my s. repens grown in a high-tech with about 80 PAR at the substrate:

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Under weaker light the leaves will angle upwards and the stems will become more "leggy" between nodes.

[angelcraze2]

Just to comment on hygro angustifolia, this one can develop surprisingly solid roots. It surprised me trying to move them for a stem plant. And staurogene repens is one of my faves. It hardly needs to be trimmed, maybe once a month to stay short, and the roots are extremely long! Good suggestions.

[BluewaterBoof]

I love angustifolia. It was one of my first plants that I ever bought and I used them in almost every tank to some degree or another. As Kat said, very sturdy. Grew like weeds for me. Sold my trimmings to locals all the time for cold hard cash.

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[angelcraze2]

Wow, that looks awesome André! I found my H.angustifolia grew much faster once I lowered the lighting. Too strong and it grows slow and short for some reason IME.

[BluewaterBoof]

Yeah I've noticed that with a lot of stem plants. The stronger light promotes compact growth, whereas weaker light encourages more height.

In my experience with angustifolia, the trimmings become more bushy with each new "generation" of trimmings. So like my original plants had only 2 leaves per node. Then as I trimmed the tops and planted those trimmings, they started sprouting more and more leave per node. After a couple of years of this, my new trimmings were sprouting 8-10 leaves at each node.

[angelcraze2]

Very cool. I like to replant the tips when I want to spread it, even the stems with no leaves will grow new shoots, it's a very easy beautiful plant. That is one non-SA plant I'll always keep.

[sfsamm]

IME....I have never had a Mg deficiency with swords, hate to tell you after all that Internet loopholing....and my gh is 2 in my 120g with like 12 amazon swords. But I can help you with growing swords.

The swords aren't the only plants showing deficiency and the 55 isn't the only tank, it's just showing the worst in the world he 55. Even my anubias is growing pale leaves with green veins, crypts are thinner than they should be too. Other tanks are showing mild deficiencies and I won't be adjusting them just keeping up on tabs which I have a tendency to slack on in the past.

All my tanks have flourite at least, all get the same fert schedule, but this is the first tank I ever used flourite standard rather than the sand.

I just gave my new sword a second root tab and it's most definitely not buried too deep. It had a decent root to it but nothing like they get after a couple months I a tank. I put some larger and smaller stones around the base to keep the brat pack from sweeping away any loose substrate after I planted. When I pulled the stones to put the second tab under it, the flourite has settled down exposing maybe a half inch of the root ball under the plant part.


It's siesta time on the light and I'm on a short turn to be back to work, got off at 6am back at 2pm.... I'll get some photos tomorrow from the tank of the anubias see if you guys think it's something other than Mg deficiency. Maybe tonight if I get ambitious enough to deal with undoing timers and whatnot lol.

[sfsamm]

Alright here's some examples of what I have going on.

Anubias both nana and I believe coffeefoilia, the narrow leaf and bartoli are also experiencing the same issue, only in this tank. 20171026_073541.jpg20171026_073714.jpg

A crypt I noticed while scrutinizing the tank last night after work, it doesn't show well in the photos but definitely has thin leaves and the second you can definitely see that hooked tip. First real hooked tips I've seen in any of my crypts though it has appeared sporadically in various plants was mostly fast growing plants, I thought, until noticing this. 20171026_073608.jpg

Lastly, this is just a spot that was already existing on the new sword but is very similar if not the same as what the entire plant ends up looking like as it fades to nothingness in all the other swords I've had in the tank. 20171026_073751.jpg


Everything posted sideways, sorry, I didn't take the photos that direction I promise.... -_-