"wary chicken" wrote in message
oups.com...
Thanks Sandy for your response.

Hi, wary, if you do'nt mind I'll chip in here as well with my 0.02 worth

I've found the following plants so far:

Hygrophila corymbosa v. 'siamensis' (Giant Hygro)

I have these; I'm very impressed with them - they look great - grow well and
propigate easily. They root best if a substrate fertilizer is applied.
Bettas will love resting on this ones leaves. My SAE's do it all the time.

Hygrophila corymbosa 'stricta'

This one's common name is Blue Stricta (I think). I have this too. My
Gourami loves this stuff. Easy to grow and nice looking. When the leaves hit
the water surface they turn darker than the submerged leaves.

Hygrophila difformis (wisteria) - background, med-high light

This is a bit strange in my tank. But, I think it was sensitive to
fertilization more than anything. It's relatively slow growing in my tank,
but to propigate it, you just lie one of the strands down on the substrate
and weight it with rocks and all the nodes will shoot roots. You cut the
node sections and bingo! several new Wisteria. It's leaves submerged are
segmented but above water they look like the leaves of a tea plant. The
Asian fish I have like this one too. So do the lyretailed swords and the
Phantom Black Tetras.

Limnophila sessiliflora (Asian Ambulia) - background, med-high light

This is the plant you can cut back real hard and it will sprout many new
fronds. The acceptable way to multiply this one is to lop the top 1/3 to
2/3rds off and just stick the tops in the gravel. The tops turn into plants
in their own right and the bottoms will divide at the cuts and give you a
divided plant.

In my experience if this doesn't grow fast enough it's prone to algae and
diatom infestation, more so than the leaves of other plants. That said
though, since I posted yesterday about Asian Ambula, mine has grown an inch
(2.5cm) in 24 hours, so now it's breaking the water surface it's time to lop
the tops off and plant them for an increase.

This is a really good plant for egg layers and any fish which needs a bit of
cover. Some of my fish seem to enjoy stroking their backs with the leaves
too

As far as light goes with this one; it will grow it's nodes close together
and become bushy in low light and will have dark green leaves. In higher
light it grows more upright, a lighter green with about 2cm between the
nodes. The top leaves will gain a reddish tinge to them as they get nearer
to the light.

It's a beautiful plant that's fairly easy to grow and reminds me of a
lighter version of some of the hornworts or foxtails.

Do these sound feasible? Any other suggestions?

I recommend them I haven't any experience of the other plants I've
deleted because they don't seem to be readily available in this country. Or,
in my case they are too pricey for budget minded me

Have you seen Hygrophilia polysperma? It hails from the Asian biotope (India
to Thailand) and goes off. Nice looking too and very easy to grow. I just
got some of this and I've been warned that it will grow out of control if I
don't prune it

Oz