What Are The Best Carpeting Plants for Your Aquarium?

A question I get asked all the time is, "What's a good carpeting plant?" Your selection of carpeting plantss depend on the size of your tank, the lighting, the type of fish you have, and your usage of CO2 system. While the substrate can matter, most of these plants will grow just fine in coarse sand, aquasoil, or other planted tank substrates.

Dwarf Four-Leaf Clover

This is, without a doubt, my favorite carpeting plant. It's like choosing your favorite child! It just works so well. While a few people have had issues with it, it's a very easy plant that can grow in almost any condition as long as it isn't buried in very fine sand. It doesn't need a lot of light or CO2. I even had it growing in a tank that was completely covered with floating plants, so there was barely any light reaching the bottom, and the CO2 system wasn't even working. If you want a super easy carpeting plant, especially for a smaller tank, Dwarf Four-Leaf Clover is the way to go.

Monte Carlo

Monte Carlo is a bit of a mixed bag for me. It works in some tanks and not in others, but for the most part, I have more success with it than I have failures. I've also heard from a lot of people who have had great success with this plant in low light or with no CO2. While I haven't tested it in super low light and no CO2 conditions yet, I can tell you that it grows incredibly fast. As long as it gets enough light, it should be fine without CO2.

It's also a very versatile plant. You can use it as a foreground plant, or you can attach it to rocks and driftwood where it will latch on. You might have to help it a little bit by wrapping some string around it, but it will root onto things. I've rooted it on Dragonstone, and it worked out pretty well.

Microsword

I've had a bit of an issue with this plant in the past with a narrow leaf variation, but that was a long time ago. I've been trying it again more recently and I'm very impressed. I have it growing under Aqueon lights with no CO2, and it's doing really well. I'm actually a bit surprised by it. I would rank it as a pretty easy carpeting plant, especially since it's growing well for me without CO2 and with barely any light.

Dwarf Sedge

A popular carpeting plant, Dwarf Sedge, is a bit of a mixed bag and can get tall depending on the lighting condition that you set up. If you have a really powerful light, it will typically stay shorter. If you don't have a lot of light, it will get a bit taller, making it better for a midground plant in a larger tank, like a 40 to 75-gallon tank. The other plants would be more ideal for tanks smaller than 40 gallons, but you could use them in bigger tanks, too.

Dwarf Sedge grows by producing runners. It will basically produce a small leg and then a new baby plant from there, and that's how it reproduces. It's a rosette-type plant, which means all the plants come out from a center location, and it has roots from that center location.

It doesn't really need CO2, and it should be fine without it. It is a bit of a slow grower at first, but once it gets established, it gets going fast.

Moss

This is probably the most overlooked carpeting plant. You can use pretty much any kind of moss, but my preference is Christmas Moss, Mini Christmas Moss, or Weeping Moss. You could even use Flame Moss if you wanted to.

You can create a carpet-like effect with moss by either sprinkling it out or tying it to things and allowing it to carpet on its own. It's going to take a very long time, as moss grows very slowly. If you don't mind slow-growing plants, you can let it as it is and its leaves will soon fill the tank. The good thing about it is that, slow-growing plants like this are easier to maintain.