[ahem]

I got a few different orders of "dwarf baby tears". I notice they come in two formats. In one, that I think are grown by the vendor, I got a mass of tiny stem plants with little to no roots. I have planted those as if they are stem plants, just inserting them 1-3 at a time into the substrate. So far they look good. They are taller than carpet and will require cut and replant I guess to get them into a carpet form.

The other format I purchased is "Hemianthus Callitrichoides Cuba" and is one of those tissue culture cups (not Tropica, a different brand). This format looks like a carpet and has lots of roots on it. The roots are everywhere, it's like a mass of roots and leaves and very difficult to impossible to separate into individual stems. I just cut up the disk (after rinsing the gel) and pressed the pieces down into the substrate where they stayed somehow and looked good initially. However that is doing terrible after just a few days. It's turning brown and I can see possibly some algae hairs attacking which means I might have to pull it and not wait to see if it "adjusts". How are you supposed to plant this variant that comes with roots on? Do you just lay on the substrate, pressing down a little? There is nothing to bury.

Have a couple pictures.

This is the Hemianthus Callitrichoides Cuba tissue culture cup (the kind with gel in it), planted 4 days ago. These looked better than the ones below when planted, they were a deep lush green.

These are the "bunches" of "dwarf baby tears" with no roots I got, I believe grown by the vendor, also planted 4 days ago. These have gotten more green and healthy looking since planting. Obviously not a mat yet.

I feel I did something wrong with planting the tissue culture cup and not sure what it is. Why do these come in two varieties, one with roots, one without? Does that give a clue as to how they are grown? Like one was emersed and the other grown as a floating plant?

 

[Joshism]

Some tissue culture plants that I have had didn't come with roots. For whatever reason, I wasn't able to plant them, so I let them sit around exposed to light. After awhile, they started growing roots while in the tissue culture. For dwarf baby tears, I read that if you use tap water to rinse it, the chlorine and whatever else is in the tap water will kill it immediately, so I suggest using cycled aquarium water. I have had more success with emerged dwarf baby tears from www.liquidcreations.co (I'm not sure why they don't have an "m" at the end of their URL). Also, when you transition them to submerged, you need to remove the fish and blast your CO2, and slowly wean them off of it.