Tips onGrowing a Microsword Carpet?

[gobluewolverines4]

Hello all!
I set up my 10 gallon recently with a brand new setup.
For starters, I have 2 5000k CFL Daylight bulbs
I recently setup DIY CO2 with a Cascade Power filter as my diffuser. The bubbles come out extremely tiny!
My substrate is flourite with a little black gravel on top.
For flora i have a background rotala indica, a java fern attached to a piece of driftwood, and then in the foreground I have about 7-8 little "tufts" of Microsword.

Now my dilemma is I want this Microsword to carpet, but I've heard from many people that I should have gone with something else, like DHG or Dwarf Baby Tears.

Is it possible to grow a carpet with Microsword? Or should i just bite the bullet and go buy a new plant to carpet, or should I stick with it? Do my parameters even support a Carpet of Microsword?

Any tips would be much appreciated!

By the way, the fauna is about 25 RCS and 1 Assassin Snail.

 

[Billbug68]

I've attempted it, and came pretty close before I broke down the tank. I found the key is trimming the runners, and to start out with A LOT of ms. The problem is, the runners never split off in to more runners. You plant a section and it just grows in a straight line.

So when you plant, trim the runners to have about 3-4 leaves each, and make a group of about 3-4 of those, then plant in a checkerboard pattern about 1/2"-1" apart. This way you have runners going out in all directions, and a lot of them.

Another problem I had is ms is a fairly slow grower and tends to get algae on the leaves.

Also, how many watts are your CFLs? I had 2 13 watt 6500k CFLs over my 10. You might be able to find a pic of it in the thread I had about it.

Oh and root tabs will help as well.

Good luck with it!