Is this normal for water sprite?

[Lexi B]

I've got a water sprite in my betta's tank, which is  a foot in height. I originally wanted water wisteria, but couldn't track it down and went with sprite despite it preferring to grow tall rather than bushy. I've had the plant for nearly 8 months, and it grows like a weed But it seems like periodically, it drops one of it's older branches and grows a new one. (Maybe about a every month or two?) It's also constantly putting out baby plants. I know with some plants, self propagation is a sign of distress. Am I doing this wrong?

 

It's planted in about 2 inches of fluval stratum. I feed with easy carbon, easy green, and the tank gets periodic root tabs to support the lily and supplement the sprite. Temp is usually around 78, water's very soft and leans basic- about 8.0.

[MattyM]

I don't know about the branches, but I just planted some water sprite I got from the co-op and it already had a bunch of those baby plants on it. I snipped them off and planted them, it was like 4 plants for the price of one!

[JettsPapa]

That is common for water sprite.  It's my understanding that it's a fern, and that's how the propagate.  By the way, I'm puzzled by your statement ". . . and went with sprite despite it preferring to grow tall rather than bushy."  That hasn't been my experience.  If it's not trimmed water wisteria grows straight up for me, while water sprite spreads out.  To put it another way, my water wisteria grows like a tree and water sprite grows like a shrub.

[PotatoFish]

Having lots of baby plants grow off of healthy water sprite is totally normal. It's not like java fern where it's a sign of distress. I think of water sprite as the aquatic version of a "spider plant."

Because it's a rosette plant, I agree with @JettsPapa that it tends to grow more like a bush than a tree.