# Sad sword



## GoldieCrazie (Oct 2, 2010)

I am really trying to save my withering amazon sword.

6 months ago when I bought it, it was 15 inches tall and luscious, now it is about one to two inches tall. I actually bought 4, the other 3 withered and died quickly (any plant with 'sword' in the name seems to die on me). 

Things I have tried:
1. Adding new potting soil in its area
2. Fert tabs in my substrate (aquariumplants.com)
3. Potting it with a fert rock from a recent plant purchase. (it livened up for a bit and sent out a stalk with some babies, but quickly deteriorated into its current state)

Now I have it in a 5 gallon emersed setup. I crushed some lava rock and sprinkled a thin layer, added 1+ inches of soil, and topped with some gravel (I also placed a fert rock under its roots). I read that lava rock has lots of good minerals, I figured if its true it might help if not it couldn't hurt. 1) 15w mini coil flourescent bulb for lighting. There is also some inderect light from windows. Fast forward 4 weeks it appears to be a tad greener but it is still shrinking. I placed a few anubias and a few crypts that my goldfish abused into the tank too. I expected a more drastic improvement by now. The only plant that appears to be liking their new setup is my A. Barteri, sent out a new leaf last week!!

Am I doing something wrong? Should I scrap the emersed idea and fill the tank?


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## EDGE (Feb 28, 2004)

Emersed sword needs a high Nitrogen formula since they don't have fish waste to supplement the N. If you are using planted aquarium suggested ratio for emersed setup, you are not giving enough N to the sword plant.

Go with jobes stick 13-4-5 or jobes lush ferns and palm or terrestrial 20-20-20 fertilizer. 

Swords need to have the root established first before they will take off. Did you add dolomite or anything for ca/mg in the soil? What kind of soil is it?


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## GoldieCrazie (Oct 2, 2010)

Thank you for your response.

I used my garden soil, it is silty loam. Unless lava rock has ca/mg in it I did not add anything to supplement the ca/mg.

I will look into adding the fertilizers you suggested for the N.


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