# Dwarf hairgrass "lawns"



## KC21386 (Feb 15, 2008)

I would love to have a full foreground covered with dwarf hairgrass. Can anyone show me some pictures of theirs and include their lighting/CO2/ferts? I would really appreciate it. 

I have 78 watts of CF at 6500k over a 20 gallon hex tank, with pressurized CO2, and basically no ferts. Will I be successfull?

Thanks everyone.


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## dekstr (Oct 23, 2007)

You will need to add fertilzer with your lighting amount. Light drives nutrient uptake, so you need to supplement nutrients in order to keep up with the hungry plants. You have co2 already, so it'd be a waste if you don't add ferts.

I find that dwarf hairgrass needs a rich substrate like planted substrate to grow dense and healthy.

Anyway here is a picture of some of my overgrown dwarf hairgrass in my 2.5g. It has DIY CO2, sunlight only and flourite black substrate. I sprinkle KNO3, KH2PO4 and trace elements 3x a week and 50% water changes once a week. There is some thread algae, and dot algae on the glass, but the plants are algae free otherwise.

http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/4420/74821241rn6.jpg


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## lauraleellbp (Feb 3, 2008)

x2 on you can't run that amount of lighting without using ferts.

www.RexGrigg.com is a good place to read up on and also buy dry ferts at a good price.


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## efish (Apr 23, 2006)

i use 2 diy co2, with 65W over my 20g-Tall and do 2x weekly ferts per rex's ferts. horrible pic and it has since grown in more. The problem i find is that it grows where it wants. the runners just go every direction and don't realize that i want them to stay in the front... but it's still a nice plant for my cherries to climb on.


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## dr.tran (Oct 8, 2007)

I'm sorry but that seems to be more like regular hairgrass. Or is there one thats smaller and thinner than dwarf hairgrass?


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## moogoo (Dec 7, 2007)

Here's my 10 gal with 20W 10K light 10 hrs a day.










It has DIY CO2 with hagen ladder, some flourish once a week and water change once a month. That lawn you see there is about 3 months old. it's pretty dense and thick. This was after a hackjob on all my stems and rearranging them, that's why it looks so sparse.


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## Stasiu (Sep 9, 2007)

I don't think a rich substrate is required, i've grown a thick lawn in a 10 gallon with masonary gravel (2mm - 3mm). It did however respond to high light, CO2, and fertz. With your light and no fertz, i would bet the tips will turn brown pretty fast.


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## dhavoc (May 4, 2006)

mine currently, i used to maintain it as a lawn across the whole front of the tank (120g) but i found my corry's seem to like a little bare gravel for browsing and pulled up some. it gave me space to save my erios also, which were being buried by the grass. will post a pic later of when i used to cut it like a lawn with grass shears. it was actually nicer than my real lawn outside...


ok, image shack works again.

current tank look:



closer pic of it "sheared" before i pulled up a chunk in the middle



another pic

[img=http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/6082/img6976pl4.th.jpg]


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## dekstr (Oct 23, 2007)

I remember at my LFS there were like 2-3 different species of hairgrass excluding the dwarf and regular types. I bought all of them but after a BBA outbreak they have all died before I could salvage any. 

I believe you can even have a dwarf hairgrass carpet w/o co2 and low-light. It just takes a very long time for it to fully carpet. 

Yeah I find most carpet plants grow where they please. I have stopped trying to organize the way they grow and just went with the flow. Now I pull up plants that get out of their way! lol


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## moogoo (Dec 7, 2007)

my hairgrass does kind of take over. What i do is dig my scissors into the substrate at the point where I want it to stop, cut, then pull the entire runner out. Gives me a clean line where I want it to be. It is a wonderful plant though and I love the dense, fine leaves. Just wish there were a way to trim it without it getting everywhere ...


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## eyebeatbadgers (Aug 6, 2007)

This is a beautiful tank from our friend on this forum anthony squire.


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## mott (Nov 23, 2006)

My 55 gallon bout a month ago


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