Planting Techniques for Foreground Plants

For a good amount of us in this hobby, attaining the picturesque aquascapes of the likes of Amano, Tom, and many others can be a desired and challenging endeavor. Often, it can be very frustrating to believe you're doing everything right but still not get the results you're looking for.

In the short amount of time I've been in the hobby of planted aquariums I've noticed that of all the skills to be good at, patience seems to be one of the top three. Of course, research and sharing of information plays a big part in a successful tank and in this respect I highly value the wealth of information on this forum and the people who put this together.

Onto the thread topic of planting techniques for foreground, carpeting plant like HC and HG among others. There is an excellent article on this forum about growing HC in particular, emmersed before filling the tank with water. Of course, this is wonderful if you're starting a new tank. However, there are many of us out there who have tanks that are already filled with plants and livestock who are looking for good techniques to introduce carpeting plants without the hassle of algae and uprooting.

I hope that people out there who have been successful in this area will share their experience and techniques for all to learn from. I'll share an experiment that I am currently doing and will update my progress to this thread. I'm attempting to use the emersed technique with a custom setup I'll elaborate on.

Here's my setup. I don't know if it will work or not but I'm optimistic. The plan is grow the HC in plastic cups emmersed using my current aquarium to provide the moisture and light. Once the HC is well rooted I'll transplant the whole thing to the tank. The netting is suppose to help me retain the gravel while I place it in the tank. I normally have a sheet of plastic covering the cups for humidity and moisture but I took them off to take the picture.

I'm trying this technique with Lilaeopsis 'Mauritius' also: