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Re: Huge Nuphar Japonica free for donation to Defense Fund



At 03:42 AM 5/2/2003, Eric Olson wrote:

> I just removed an enormous Nuphar Japonica from my tank.

Please Dave, tell us how you were able to keep this plant alive and
thriving!  Every time I have tried Nuphar, it has suffered from the
dreaded rotting-cutting problem and slowly disintegrated.  The only person
I knew who had success had grown them from seed.  This is going on eight
years ago, and much has changed in terms of fertilizer and lighting, so I
am very interested in hearing of positive experiences growing it.

I got the plant last November from Robert at Aquabotanic. It had 6 large leaves, each about 4-5 inches long on 8-10 inch stems, plus another four 2 inch leaves just sprouted off the rhizome.


The large leaves didn't make it, they just rotted away like crypt rot after a week. The smaller leaves all survived, and more started sprouting after two weeks. The plant has grown steadily since then.

Weird observation: the plant moved visibly forward through the gravel. It migrated five inches forward since I've had it. This turned out to be because of the orientation of the rhizome under the gravel, and the fact that there were established plants with root systems behind it but not in front of it. This did NOT help-the plant is MUCH too big now, and MUCH too far forward.

My tank parameters from November-March:

GH2, KH2 (GH is now 3)
pH 6.4-6.6
pressurized CO2
220 Watts AHS lighting & reflectors, 12 hours/day
100% Flourite substrate with lots of mulm
Full fert regimen (traces-iron-nitrates)
No added substrate ferts except on swords (not near this plant)
80-81 degrees F

What else? I wasn't sure whether to bury the rhizome or not, so I flipped a coin and buried it. But it's a thick rhizome, and with all the roots, there was probably only a half-inch of Flourite over the top, and Flourite isn't very dense.

The root system grew HUGE. Pulling it out disrupted more than half the tank. Again, Flourite isn't very dense, so the disruption was pretty bad.

Now doesn't anyone want this thing? It's a gorgeous light green, that looks really good against red plants.