# planting Hemianthus callitrichoides



## 830 (Mar 3, 2007)

i received 2 orders of HC from aquaspot today. they looked great but the roots appearedto be a little bit yellow. anyways, it was a pain in the butt planting them. i basically separated them into small 1" groupings and laid them down on the substrate then i threw more substrate over them to keep them down. i was wondering if this is a good way to plant them? ive heard of people taking them apart into tiny little pieces and i just dont have the time to do that. will my HC still grow with a some substrate covering over them? how long until the HC is rooted? also, ive seen pictures of HC being planted onto rocks and pieces of wood... how is this possible? arent the roots supposed to be planted into the substrate. thanks guys.


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## eklikewhoa (Jul 24, 2006)

I don't know about the rocks and stuff but I broke it down to a few strands and just planted them with princettes/tweezers. Doing what you did would work too but I wanted to spread the HC more evenly and gave it a chance to spread a bit faster.

Mine took a few weeks and it rooted really well.


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## wiste (Feb 10, 2006)

> i basically separated them into small 1" groupings and laid them down on the substrate then i threw more substrate over them to keep them down. i was wondering if this is a good way to plant them?


I planted some in this manner and some by breaking them apart and planting the tiny pieces.
Those planted individually did better. It took several weeks to get rooted and start growing.
Planting them is much easier if you use fine tipped tweezers.










Avoid disturbing them with water current and it would be better if there were no fish in the tank until the plant is established.
ETA:
The reason for the preference of the fine tip tweezers is that the tip allows opening of the tweezers such that soil surrounds the plant easily. Flat tip tweezers tend to allow the plant to float away because flat tips force the substrate away from the plant when you open them.


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

Not every substrate is good for HC. The best seem to be those with a fairly small grain size but with very dense particles. I've tried it in soilmaster select and it never stays put long enough to get rooted. Eco complete is better but it still isn't ideal.

I recommend separating the parts into very small pieces. Then, as Dennis says, enter a zen-like state and start planting. It might take an hour or two to cover a small area. I usually separate out the little bits on a dinner plate and plant with very small forceps/pincettes/tweezers. Put each twig about 1/2 in and 1/2 out of the substrate. In high light, with good CO2 it takes me about a month to get a nice carpet. In two months it is nice and thick, with a bit of a 3-D effect to it.

Once it grows in, sometimes large mats will have a tendency to lift up like a layer of sod. In this situation, throwing a bit of gravel over the top seems to be quite helpful.


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## Muirner (Jan 9, 2007)

did you ever get HC to root in your SMS tanks guaiac? I'm trying to find some at a decent price and i'm using SMS as a substrate. Would love to have a plant that is ALWAYS small.


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

My SMS tank is a little too low-light for HC to really be succesful. I really don't think it would that well work though. You might get it to grow, but eventually, I think large sections would come up on its own. I can't even get Blyxa to stay put in SMS some of the time.


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## Leonard (Mar 4, 2007)

Can you tie HC at stones? will they grow fixed to the stone then, with the roots?


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## Troy McClure (Aug 3, 2005)

In nature, HC will a lot of times grow in patches between rocks on the water's edge, and as most people who have imported HC know, it does quite well as an emersed plant. http://www.tropica.com/article.asp?type=aquaristic&id=621

So it does not need to -always- be planted into the substrate. It can be used to great effect in unrooted situations.


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## Leonard (Mar 4, 2007)

nice, I'll maybee try it on a Red Moore root =)


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