That feeling when only one of your stems didn't rot

[Lexi B]

Bought two pennywort plants so each of my Bettas could have a nitrate guzzler, but one of them arrived to me with the roots rotted. Only one of the stems made it, but hey, he's doing fine.

 

 

[Guppysnail]

Once settled pennywort grows fast. Soon enough you can cut it in half so they each have one. 

[Lexi B]

On 12/11/2021 at 5:53 PM, Guppysnail said:

Once settled pennywort grows fast. Soon enough you can cut it in half so they each have one. 

I've noticed! The other healthy plant has put off many new leaves and I've only had it a week 🙂

 

[Guppysnail]

Just fyi I’m don’t normally use fertilizer ever in my tanks but pennywort starts to get the holes because it eats so much. I’ve grudgingly had to start using seachem potassium so watch for that when it really gets growing. 

[Rich B]

Guppysnail do you plant or float your pennywort? 

[Guppysnail]

@Rich B I Suction cup it to the wall or clip a plant weight on and drop to the bottom. The broad leaves grow algae if I float it because I’m very heavy bioload in my tanks. 

Edited December 12, 2021 by Guppysnail

[gardenman]

I'm always happy when at least one stem/plant survives. Pretty soon that one will provide enough plants to fill a tank. I bought 25 jungle Val through eBay a while back and only one plant survived, but it's now about fifty plants from the runners it's put out, so it was a win. Sure, I lost 24 plants, but I gained a lot more later from the one that survived, so it balances out.

We had a local fish store that was run out of a couple's enclosed back porch (Evan's Tropical Fish) and they had great success with Water Sprite. They would just add a small plantlet to each bag of fish you bought. It probably took me five years to get some of their Water Sprite to live in my tanks, but once it did I had more Water Sprite than I knew what to do with.

These days I try to buy plants in multiples and spread them out to various tanks and hope they live in one. If they'll live in just one of the tanks, they'll eventually spawn enough new plants to spread them everywhere. Probably ten or fifteen years ago I bought a little tissue-culture cup of Anubias Nana Petite. I've got it everywhere now. Even rafts of it floating in tanks where I don't have room to plant it. There's probably $300 worth of Anubias Nana Petite now in my tanks from that one little cup of it. If you can get just one stem to live, it'll repay you many times over. It's the getting that one stem/plant to live that can be challenging sometimes.

[Rich B]

Thank you Guppysnail. I love both your ideas. I've been floating mine but don't really like that way. Thanks again.