Good parameters, Good CO2, Good light, Poor plant growth?

[Dennis Wong]

Any guidance on how to care for carpeting plants in an analgous manner to what's described here for stem plants?

There are a few approaches to this. More resilient carpets such as dwarf hair grass and monte carlo can take quite a bit of over-crowding and build-up of old growth. However, their rootzones eventually do get compacted with old root systems, and top growth deteriorates. The planted aquarium world tries to ignore this problem, because the idea of replanting carpet is off putting to most folks. The reality is that no carpet can be maintained forever just by trimming top growth.

There are a couple of ways to cope with this:
1. Slow down the growth rate so that the carpet is almost "frozen" in place, new growth is produced at such a slow rate that over-crowding take years to manifest. This is actually the method that ADA systems use. Their aquasoil gives an initial growth boost to plants, and as the aquarium matures, the nutrient levels drop as the aquasoil get depleted, and growth slows down overall as the aquarium gets fully grown. This works when the plant selection is one that accommodates lean levels well : Java fern, cryptocoryne species and other hardy plants. Both lowering CO2 and nutrient/light levels work.

2. Actively replant portions of the carpet by up-rooting and replanting sections on a rotational basis. This renews the carpet as if they are stem plants. Works well, but folks just hate doing replanting so.

3. Many folks do a combination of 1 & 2. Carpets like monte carlo naturally slow down a bit as they grow thicker with age. Folks trim to keep the carpet thin enough to prevent floating, and this can be done for many cycles before eventually the bottoms deteriorates and replanting work has to be done.

4, Switch to sand banks to reduce carpet management. This is the solution that most competition aquascapers use nowadays. In many dioramas that use slower growing plants such as Buceps, mosses, anubias and other that grow on hardscape, the carpet is the single most labour intensive thing to manage. So folks opt for either a very small carpet area or replace it entirely with sand bank.

5. Switch to slower growing species. In recent months I've been trying to explore slower growing stuff for foreground - Small erios, Anubias, Bucephalandra. Blood vomit is a high skilled alternative. Slightly pickier to grow, but you don't have to chase runners that run into other plant clusters because they don't spread by producing runners.