Advice on Amazon Sword Propagation

[Ceej]

Ok, so this is my current tank. It's a 10 gallon Aqueon LED and is doing a whole lot better than when I started.
My water params are all fine, with the exception of my pH which feels a tad low (6.4) and sometimes fluctuates a bit.
Inhabitants are 3 female guppies (pink tuxedos) and 1 blue male guppy (he's skinny, I'm fattening him up and it also may be a female) and 5 neon tetras.

For the Amazon Swords I added fertilizer tabs and I dose with a liquid carbon fertilizer every other day. Lights are on for 12 hours, 7:30 am to 7:30 pm. I have tried keeping the bubbler on and off, alternating days as I think it might be a bit strong, maybe forcing the CO2 out of the water?

Anyway, these swords have been in the tank for over a month now, were in the tank during the initial cycling (fishless) and ... I'd like them to look healthier to thrive a bit more but I'm not sure how. I'm also concerned about these weird root structures on the leaves. I assume this is how the plant can propagate -- leaf falls over to the bottom and sends out runners in the substrate, from which new plants form?

Ok, so please have a gander:

So you can see on the top middle section these roots growing out of the top of the leaf. You will also notice on the leaf at the right a very clean cut -- I over-reacted, thinking this was some kind of exotic algae and snipped off the tip of that leaf. 😞 You can also see at the base of the leaf on the left a huge tangle of more roots. So ... assuming I'm correct and this is an attempt at propagation... what do I do? Should I try to remove these little bundles and try to plant them elsewhere? Should I bend the leaf over and tuck that end into the substrate? Or do nothing and just leave it alone?

This is about 4 days after I reworked the layout of the plants in the aquarium. I was away for a week and so figured I'd do a major water change (40%) and used that as an opportunity to put in the root tabs and space the plants out a bit better. When I removed the plants I looked them all over, the roots clusters seemed larger than I remember, so I think they are healthy, but feel free to tell me otherwise.

Also ... I see these small orange nodules on another leaf:

Right in the middle, you will see these tiny orange nodules... are those root systems waiting to grow as well? Does this signal something about my plants that is unhealthy? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I love my plants, I want them to grow more.

[Koi]

It looks like you have java fern not an amazon sword and the roots you are seeing coming out the leaves are baby plantlets. You can pluck them off if you like but it might be even better just to let them either fall off on their own or allow the plantlet to get a little bigger.

Also you might want to pull the java fern out of the substrate a little. It might not be an issue but you could run the risk of having the rhizome of the plant rot out.

The rhizome would be the horizontal part of the plant where the leaves are coming out. You can try tying/gluing it to that piece of wood. 

Since java fern pulls nutrients through the water you don't need to use root tabs anymore unless thats your only source of fertilizer.

I wouldn't worry about losing co2 with the air stone, it might even be more beneficial to leave it on.

Edited July 6, 2021 by Koi

[Phantom240]

I'm with @Koi on this one, looks like Java Fern to me. 

[Randall from Texas]

I would run the air 24/7. Are you using any liquid fert beside easy carbon? 

[DaveO]

I thought easy carbon is an algaecide not a fertilizer.

[Ceej]

Thank you for the help!

Yeah, I think you're right that it is java fern. I bought these plants and really should have kept the container label so I'd know exactly what they are. Since researching 'java fern' online I see photos that resemble what's happening in my tank. I have been adding Seachem 'Flourish' for about 3 weeks and added the root tabs about a week ago.

So I guess I'll wait to let those little plantlets grow a bit more and then try to pry them off and tie them to something.

I will run the bubbler 24/7.

Thanks again for the insight guys.

[Randall from Texas]

On 7/7/2021 at 5:53 AM, DaveO said:

I thought easy carbon is an algaecide not a fertilizer.

That's what I was getting at. Tabs plus flourish plus easy carbon is good. Easy carbon just allows plants to take in more instead of algae.