Help with HC

[liangziqian]

hi all,

just hoping i could get some advice on getting my dwarf baby's tears to grow. the 29 gallon tank was set up about a month and a half ago, plants include java fern, java moss, anubias coffeefolia, anubias nana, cabomba carolinia, and anacharis/elodea. there are a few other plants that i don't have identified yet.

i got two pots of HC shipped to me and they looked okay. i removed most of the cotton wool and tried planting the whole clumped mass of HC into the gravel, which is relatively fine grained. despite pretty good lighting (using CFL retrofit, 4x13 watt (equivalent to 60 watts each of conventional tungsten bulb), 5600 K) and a moderate supply of CO2, the HC's original leaves all turned yellow and melted, and there is only some tiny new growth to replace it. after having read that HC does best if each stem is planted individually, i went ahead and did just that. i also switched two of the CFL bulbs to 6500 K. i've used both substrate fertilizer as well as water column fertilizer. i'm experimenting with leaving the lights on longer as well. nothing seems to help the HC grow. anyone with experience feel like chiming in?

tank occupants are currently a few cherry red shrimp, 8 panda corydoras cats, 3 otocinclus, and 4 neon tetras, as well as bladder and ramshorn snails.

[247Plants]

Im going to guess you dont have anywhere near the light needed to grow. HC. Usually it is in the 4-5 wpg that it grows well.

[liangziqian]

does that mean that when a CFL bulb says it's equivalent to 60 regular watts but uses only 13 actual watts that for planted tank purposes each bulb is only 13 watts? that would give me 52 watts total, which isn't even 1.5 wpg. but that doesn't seem right to me if it's equivalent to 60 watts per bulb...

[247Plants]

13w of cfl = 13w of cfl

incandescents are worthless when it comes to actual light output vs. heat generated.

Not all bulbs are created equal, the wattage is generated from energy used, not light output.

[liangziqian]

gotcha. thanks for clearing that up. i guess i'll have to pick something else to fill up the foreground. any suggestions?

[j-gens]

i am growing my hc in around 2.25 wpg injected co2, turface as my substrate capped with pool filter sand and a thin layer of peat underneath it all....
i read up on this plant after trying it in a tank a while back and read that it tends to like acidic substrates... such as aquasoil...
although i think recently amano grew it in alkaline conditions???

it is a very slow grower.. as long as it hasnt died off you may be ok

[jpappy789]

Given only 1.5 wpg, I would not expect HC to grow. I would try dwarf sag or dwarf hairgrass instead.

[angyles]

yeah it's gonna be touch in that light. i have grown it in 2.5 WPG, but you're still quite a bit shy of that. most of the small cute ground cover plants seem to like higher light conditions. I agree dwarf hair grass would probably be a good choice. It will grow in < 2WPG.

[liangziqian]

i thought dwarf hairgrass needed high light too? what about java moss? will that grow as ground cover?

[angyles]

IME dwarf hairgrass has done pretty well in lower/moderate light levels. it would porbably do better in higher light, but it'll fair better the HC that's for sure.

I don't know how well java moss would do as a ground cover. you could go all creative like some people do and make a moss wall out of it, sandwiched between layers of mesh, but lay it on the ground instead. I tried that once with riccia and plastic canvas on the ground. Actually that would probably work pretty well with javamoss!

[bushwhacker]

tried HC once with 216w over a 75 g couldnt do anything with it and tossed the whole bag... got lots of java moss tho i may try the on the ground moss wall ( lol or moss floor as the case may be).... i wonder if that might stop my HRP from digging so bad?