# Sword ID Pls



## Aurie (Feb 19, 2013)

Not sure what happened to my other thread. I tried to edit my post and the whole thing just seems to have disappeared. I'm posting again thinking it's a system glitch?

Hey guys.. what's up? Hope you guys could let me know what kind of sword I have in my tank? I bought the first one from petsmart years ago in their assorted plant bin and I bought 1 more recently and it was just labeled "Small sword" .. It might just be a tiny amazon. It is a perfect mini replica of one, but the one in my 29 gallon tank is huge and these swords just stay really small. I'd love to get more I just need to know a better name than "mini sword" LOL.. generic eh?

Here's my 5.5 gallon standard rectangle tank. As you can see this sword is small. There are 2 one behind the other










Here is my 29 gallon with my 2 swords










Here is a picture I took of a random egg on my sword. The mini sword is in the foreground, the Amazon is in the background. One thing I noticed is that the amazon grows new leaves and overall grows MUCH faster than this mini sword in the same tank..

Hope this closeup is of some help


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## Yo-han (Oct 15, 2010)

Last picture looks like Helianthum latifolius...


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## Aurie (Feb 19, 2013)

When I do a google image search for Helianthum latifolius it comes up with a pretty garden flower..


I tried just googling the first word and playing around and I found helanthium-latifolius on some page I couldn't pronouce a single word on the page due to it being in another language but luckily latin is well.. latin.. yeah it looks a lot like it though! 

I did some more googling and from what I could tell it's not pygmy chain sword though. I have that in the tank and it's totally and completley different. I"m new to the sword type plants. I have never seen runners and I've had these plants for 3 years. It also doesn't have any sort of stem. Kind of like when you get a emersed amazon sword.. it'll be tall and stem like. This grows out of the crown and immediatly into a sword shape. Most leaves are 1-2cm wide


After another 20 min of googling I can say it looks a LOT like echinodorus quadricostatus var. magdalenensis based upon google image searching. Would love some more input though.


Whatever it is.. I want more of em!


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## miremonster (Mar 26, 2006)

Did the small sword produce runners in the meanwhile?
To me the leaves don't look like Helanthium (also the plants sold as Echinodorus quadricostatus, magdalenensis, xinguensis etc. are Helanthium, from the H. bolivianum group) but rather like a true Echinodorus from the same group as E. bleherae (that may be Your regular sword). The group that I mean is _Echinodorus grisebachii_ in the broader sense. 
Echinodorus parviflorus = E. grisebachii 'Parviflorus' is a somewhat smaller variant of E. grisebachii, at most not exceeding 30 cm.
There is also an E. grisebachii var. minor, described by Christel Kasselmann, but I don't know if that plant is still cultivated, let alone beyond Europe.


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## Yo-han (Oct 15, 2010)

I'm sorry, I meant Helanthium indeed, full name: Helanthium bolivianum latifolius_._ Like miremonster said, it needs to produce runners to be a Helanthium.http://www.flowgrow.de/pflanzen/Helanthium-bolivianum-latifolius-Echinodorus-latifolius-359.html


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