HOW TO TRIM AQUARIUM PLANTS LIKE A PRO!

Welcome back everybody. Hope you're doing well. Today we're going back to the basics. I think I've got a couple hundred videos on my YouTube channel, but I've never made one dedicated about trimming aquatic plants. I'm sure I've talked about it in like a maintenance video or something, but never a full video on this topic alone. I think that we should change that. So let's get started. Okay, so those are different types of aquatic plants. So let's make it a little bit easier for ourself. And let's just divide them into six groups. So the first group is your stem plants. So I'm thinking Rotala, Ludwigia, Hygrophila. There's loads of different types of stem plants. I think that's actually the biggest group as well. Group number two is the Rosette plants. So if I'm thinking Rosette plants, Cryptocoryne for example, or Echinodorus. And group number three is the Carpeting plants. So Monte Carlo, Dwarf Hairgrass, Glossostigma, Marsilea, stuff like that. Then group number four is the Epiphytes or the Rhizome plants. So Java Ferns, Anubias, Bush of London and stuff like that. Group number five is the Moss. Kind of speaks for itself. And the last one, group number six, is the Tubers or the Bulbs. So like your Lotus or your Lilies and Aponegytons for example. Because let's start with the stem plants because I think this is where people struggle the most. Like a question I get asked a lot is like how to get those really dense stem plant bushes. So I think this is something that people have difficulties with. So let me actually do a little bit of a drawing. So just imagine that you've just set up a new tank like a few weeks ago. You planted your stem plants and everything is growing. And this is kind of the current situation. So this is our substrate. Here we have our stems. And they've grown quite a bit already in the past two weeks. But there's quite a lot of space between each stem. It's not a really big deal but we want those really dense stem plant bushes. So how do we achieve that? Because now imagine that it's been like three or four weeks in total and it's time for the first trimming session. So where do you start trimming your stem plants? I would always recommend to, for the first trimming session, to do it as low as possible. So like somewhere over here. Somewhere like that. And the new situation is kind of gonna look like this. So we basically just have a few very low stalks basically. So then you kind of end up with something looking like this. So this tank is now a month old. I just did the first trimming session a few days ago. I could have actually gone a little bit lower but I've planted this one quite dense so I didn't have to go all the way down to the substrate. Now what's so amazing about stem plants is that every time you trim them, two new stems will appear from the place where you cut. So we just had five stalks. And from every stalk, two new stems are gonna appear. Okay, excuse my drawing skills but I think you get the point. So now we have 10 stems. So we're already getting a little bit more dense. But one thing we haven't done yet is we haven't replanted the tops that we trimmed. So if we go back to this drawing, here we had five stems and this part was cut off. What do we do with that? We can either throw it away or we can sell it but we can also replant it. So that means we could add those five stems back in here. That's four. Another one here. Here we go. So now we've basically created 15 stems out of just those five stems that we had earlier. And this is something that we can of course keep doing over and over again. So for the second trimming session, we can actually cut it a little bit higher. So let's say here. So this should be the situation after your second trimming session. So this was the first trimming session, quite low. Second trimming session was a little bit higher. So now we basically have 15 stalks. But if this is starting to grow back again, then we're gonna get two here, two here, and so on and so on. So basically after the second trimming session, we should get 30 stems. So in that way, things are gonna start multiplying pretty fast. And this is something that you can keep doing for quite a while. But at some point, you will start noticing that your stem plants will not grow as great anymore. And at that point, I would always recommend to do one final trimming session, then save all the beautiful stems, and then remove this entire bottom section. Kind of just discard it. And kind of refresh the subset as well. Add in some fresh nutrients, add in some root tap, something like that. And then just replant those healthy tops. And that's it. So that's kind of the basic procedure for trimming stem plants. So in a nutshell, for the first trimming session, just trim them very low. And every trimming session after that, you just go a little bit higher and replant the tops if you want to create even more density. And you can just do it over and over again until you notice some deficiencies or just not really good growth. Then you just start over again. And that's kind of the basic procedure for stem plants. Now let's move on to the rosette plants. Okay, for the rosette category, I'm just gonna give you a few examples. So let's start here with the Big Shallow. In the foreground here, we have the rosette plant. This is the Halanthium polypheanum. And with the rosette plants, it actually doesn't really matter how you trim them. So for example, this one here, the few leaves here have some blackbrush algae on them. So we can just cut some individual leaves. I always recommend to cut as close to the substrate or as close to the rosette as possible. Here we go. So that's a leaf removed. See as close to the rosette as possible. It doesn't really matter. Any part that you cut off will either start growing back or maybe it will just die off. Depends a little bit on the plant. So here's another example. I have a really small Echinodorus here. And here we can just trim a few individual leaves. So we just wanna get as close to the rosette as possible, as close to the substrate as possible. And just cut that off. And I could do that with every single leaf and there wouldn't be any issue with the plant and it will happily grow back. Now in terms of new growth, it's not the same as with stem plants. It's not like I just trimmed that one leaf of Echinodorus and now I'm gonna get two new leaves back. Basically the part that I left after the trimming, so the little stalk, that's just gonna die off. And over time, new leaves will start to appear on the rosette itself, in the center. But it's not like I trimmed one leaf so I'm gonna get two new leaves back. It's just more random. Now something else you would get with most rosette plants is so-called runners. So back to the Helanthium. So here is kind of the main plant. And as you can see, it's sending out these really tiny plants all the way to the front glass here. And they're attached to a little, again, a little stalk. And if you're happy with it, you can just leave it as is but I don't really want it so I'm just gonna trim it on that little stalk and I can show you properly. So here we have an example of three runners and these are just, yeah, basically just new plants. And we can cut the stalk here and just have three individual plants and we can just replant them back into the substrate in places where we actually want them. So with these rosette plants, you can be really careful and just cut a few individual leaves like I just showed you. But you can also be pretty brutal with them as well. Like I have a clip from one of the first layouts in the Be Shallow where I had these really dense clumps of Cryptocoryne. They were looking very good but they were just a little bit too big. So I just took my scissors and I literally trimmed every single leaf of it. So we just had like a rosette with just a few small stalks and it looked horrible for a couple of weeks but if you give the plants the right conditions, enough light and nutrients, then they will grow back and they will look even better. Like the crypts grew back and they were so compact and they were just looking amazing. So yeah, you can definitely be pretty brutal with all those rosette plants as well. Okay, let's move on to the epiphytes, to the rhizome plants. Let me give you a few more examples. So here's my seven-feet escapist tank and this one was trimmed a few days ago as well. And I did quite a lot of work on the Java ferns because they're getting quite big and they were basically growing towards each other. So the passageway was just getting more and more narrow. So I kind of thinned them out a little bit. And basically what I did is with my hands, I basically get as close to the rhizome as possible and then I just remove tiny pieces of the rhizome. So basically just thinning it out a little bit. Now you can also trim Java ferns, but if you want to trim them, I would always suggest to get as close to the rhizome as possible, but that's just a little bit difficult, you know, because it's so dense, you can't really see where you are trimming, but if I just get my scissors all the way in there, I can just trim a few leaves, you know, like that's, there's no big deal. Now you can also just trim the leaves of the Java fern, like for example, this one here, doesn't really look that good. So I could just trim it off like that. And if you do that with a few, like it's no big deal, but if I would put my scissors in all of this right here, like that would look very strange, right? So I would not recommend you do that. The other epiphyte plants, Anubias, I think I have some Anubias in here as well. Okay, so I found a small little Anubias bonsai, so we can cut this one up as an example. So we have all the individual leaves, and then here we basically have the rhizome. So if you just want to like trim a few leaves, for example, this one and this one are a little bit ugly. So you could just take your scissors and just cut them off like that. Do the same to this one, just cut the leaves. If you have the clump out of the water, you can actually peel the leaves off as well. So for example, this really small one, if we just look where the leaf is attached, and you just grab it and you just gently kind of pull it off like that. Now, if you were to have a really big clump of Anubias, you can also like split the rhizome in half, and you just do that with a really sharp scissor, and then you just find a good place on the rhizome to cut it, and then you just snip it like that. So now we've cut that clump in half, and from this part, from this part, new roots will grow, and from this part, new leaves will grow. So it's kind of how you can make your Anubias clumps either smaller or just trim them. And of course, exactly the same thing that I just showed you with the Anubias also applies to bush flounder and basically to any epiphyte plant. But I mean, in general, epiphyte plants just grow very slowly, so it will rarely happen that you actually need to trim them. Maybe sometimes you just remove a few leaves if they're just not looking good, or they're covered with a little bit of algae or something. So I think that's everything on rhizome plants. So let's move on to carpeting plants. So trimming carpeting plants is very easy, it's very straightforward, and it's actually very difficult to do it wrong. So what I would recommend is to invest in a proper wave scissor. So this is just a scissor with a nice curve in there. Just makes it a lot easier to get close to the carpet, get really down low, and without having to make any awkward movements with your hand. So really recommend a wave scissor. And once you have the scissor, you can basically just get to work and do what I like to call lawnmower-style trimming. You can literally just trim everything like you're trimming a lawn. It doesn't really matter if it's Glossostigma or if it's Monte Carlo, if it's hairgrass, you can all treat it the same way. The only difference between some carpeting plants is that some are a little bit more maintenance-heavy. So for example, a carpet with Monte Carlo or Kuba or Glossostigma, those types of carpet needs to be trimmed a little bit more often compared to a carpet with dwarf hairgrass or Lilyopsis, for example. So over here in this tank, I have a carpet with dwarf hairgrass. And this has been planted, I think, two months ago now. And there is still no need to trim this. I mean, I could if I would want it a little bit shorter, but I think it's the perfect length. So there's no need to trim it. And I don't think I will have to trim this carpet anytime soon as well. So it's a little bit more, yeah, kind of low maintenance. And then over here, for example, I have my better tank. And here I have a carpet with Monte Carlo. And this carpet, I already had to trim, I think, three or four times now. Yeah, a Monte Carlo carpet just requires a little bit more trimming. And as you can see at the moment, it's a little bit yellow. I've trimmed it just over a week ago. And it's yellow because I basically neglected it a little bit. So I let it grow too thick. And then the bottom part just didn't get enough light. And then it slowly starts to die off. It started to turn yellow. So that's kind of something you want to avoid. So yeah, a carpet with Monte Carlo or Glosso Stigma or Hemianthus Cuba just requires a little bit more frequent trimming. So in general, trimming a carpet is actually pretty easy. And that's just two things that you want to avoid. First of all, you want to avoid trimming it too fast. So if you have a newly planted setup, you want to wait quite a while before your carpet is properly rooted. Because if you trim it too fast and your carpet is not properly rooted yet, then by trimming it and by that motion and by that movement, there's a good chance that you're going to uproot the carpet. So it's something you want to avoid. And the second thing you want to avoid is what I just showed you is letting it grow too thick. That the bottom part is going to get yellow. And another thing that can actually happen is that it gets too thick. And then you're going to get air trapped in the carpet and it's actually going to start lifting up. So it's again going to uproot. So yeah, don't trim it too soon. And don't wait too long with trimming it. That's basically what I'm trying to say. When besides investing in a new wave scissor, you might also want to consider purchasing a surface skimmer because after trimming your carpet, your entire water surface is going to be filled with small plant trimmings, which is a nightmare to clean without a skimmer. So yeah, I highly recommend a surface skimmer as well. Okay, so that was everything about carpeting plants. So now we can move on to the fifth category. And this is actually my least favorite category of trimming. That's the moss. Because we just talked about stem plants, rosette plants, carpeting plants. And if you trim those plants, they will all float up to the surface, which makes cleanup quite easy. You can just scoop it out with a net or use a surface skimmer. But moss doesn't float up. If you trim moss, it will all sink to the bottom and that makes it really difficult to clean up. So it's always a bit of a nightmare. So you can, of course, trim it. And then after you're done trimming, you can do your water change and kind of just siphon it out. But it's very difficult to remove everything, you know? And if you don't remove everything, then it's going to get stuck in certain places where you don't want it. And it's going to start growing there. And the worst nightmare is if it all gets stuck into your carpet. In the beginning, you might not notice it, but over time, the moss is just going to take over your entire carpet and it's just going to be, it's just not going to look as good as you want it, you know? So I've recently did a trimming session on the 30 centimeter cube behind me. And I started using my moss vacuum cleaner again. And this is actually a very easy and kind of a fun way to trim moss as well. So I basically just converted a small external canister filter into a vacuum cleaner because this way I can trim the moss and immediately siphon out all the trimmings as well. And you can do that with a normal siphon, but yeah, I mostly have small tanks. And if I do it with a normal siphon, then the water level is just going to drop too fast. It's going to drop too fast before I'm able to trim all the moss. So this moss vacuum cleaner actually works really well. I have a video about it on my YouTube channel and I'll leave a link on top of the screen right now. But yeah, trimming moss is a bit of a pain in the butt, but if you use this vacuum cleaner, it's actually quite easy. So I think that's everything on moss. You can actually, yeah, trimming moss is very easy. You can just trim whatever you want. There's no technique to it. Just cut it into a shape or just cut it however you want it. It doesn't matter. It will grow back anyway. And then the last category, the tubers and the bulbs. I think that kind of speaks for itself as well. You just want to avoid cutting the actual bulb. Just remove the leaves. And if you trim the leaves, then new leaves will appear from the bulb. So there's not really much to explain there. I think it's kind of self-explanatory. So I think that's it. I think that's everything talked about. If I missed something, just let me know in the comments and I'll just answer your question in the comment section. Yeah, that's it. Hope you guys enjoyed this back to basic video. Something that should have been done a long time ago already, but now we finally took care of it. So that's it guys. Thanks for watching. See you next time.