[Yugi]

Dear Michael,

Thank you for your answer and warm welcome.
I’m going to attack the aerial growth issue in two ways:
First, as soon as the plants seem strong enough, I will follow your advice and do a heavy pruning in order to try and force them to grow new underwater leaves.
Second, I will follow a comment made by Ms. Walstad: I will shorten the lighting period in my aquarium so that the plants don’t think its summer and slow down some. I will keep you posted on how it goes.

Regarding the thin growth: I think you are right. I have a combination of issues that are not allowing enough light to reach the bottom:

1-My aquarium is a bit too deep (28 inches from substrate surface to the top). This may be a bit too much for proper light penetration.
2- My vallisneria gigantea is getting a bit too big! It now has about 6 daughter plants and they are taking over the aquarium and its surface (see attached pics)
3- During my latest green water bloom, I added duckweed for quick nutrient uptake and algae competition. It did the job. It’s now turning into light and space devouring plague!

These three issues are surely the ones to blame for not enough light on the bottom and thin growth.
As you can see, I’m not that much of an “aquascaper”, but I will use my next big aquarium intervention to do an uprooting, re-organize everything and take some of the daughter plants out to get some more space for everyone.
Thank you for your help!

Best Regards,

Hugo