Smaller leaves, Bonsai training?

[RustyRocket]

Hi,

Was curious about if there are ways to make aquatic plants grow smaller? I'm looking for smaller foliage growth and also tigher nodes, rather than the height of the plant.

I've heard temperature affects this, hotter it is the more spread out your nodes are and sparser leaves.

Are there any other advice on this? I'm trying to make my scape more proportion.

 

[zozo]

Depending on the plants propperties and grow characteristics, fast or slow growin . Rosette, branching stem etc. etc. usualy keep trimming works pretty good but it can take very long before desired results are met. As for example i placed a bolbitis heudelottii in a small tanks midground spot where it is actualy to large in adult size because it would hide away the plant behind it. So i kept trimming its larger leaves off. Even tho it's one of the fastest growing bolbitis it's after almost a year still not as small and dense as i like it to be. And since it's a high tech tank i'm in doubt if i ever get it where i want it. The tank might be at it's end of days before this fern is addapted to the punshment i give it. But then it might just be ready to put in another tank in that perspective. So pre-growing cultivating in other tanks is not a bad idea.. Take the Cryptocoryne Lutea Hobbit as example, that's actualy a cultivation of small shoots of a larger mother plant wich also grows small size runners which stay smaller than it's mother. They took these runners off and cultivated them further as a dwarf version of the larger Lutea.. 🙂

An other technique which could work is confine it's root space, a plant grows it's roots the same size as it is above the substrate if not larger. A large plant never grows to it's full pottential in a (too) small pot.. Keeping plants in miniature size is grow them in miniature pots with regular presize trimming.

There are some things you could take in consideration regarding fertilization.. For example IE is aimed towards full and lush growth to the max. Since regular water changes are in order even over dosing isn't an issue. Now when you look at fertilization and what a plant does with certain compounts and what it needs it for. Than for example Nitrogene is the building block to grow large and thick stems and large leaves, so if you cut down on the nitrogene the plant will grow less fast and less robust. So has every compound it's role in the plants lifecycle and grow characteristics. But in a tank with different plant species together in the same medium (water) it's hard to adress each particular plant regarding fert regime. So you would realy need to know your plants and what they need and pick the right ones to place together. (trail and error)