[APD] Re: plant growers

[Thomas Barr <tcbiii at earthlink_net>]

> I've never been to one of those places that cultivate
> aquarium plants for hobbyists. Has anyone ever visited such
> a place, and can you describe how it works -- lights,
> ferts, harvesting & propagation, etc.. And that do they
> put in their water?!
> cheers,
> shireen

They put in secret sauce into the water. What else? A little "magic dust".

Actually many growers are _very anal_ here in the USA about their trade
secrets. They don't share. Their mama should have backhanded them a few more
times and told them to share more often with the other kids when they were
growing up. 

Most are greenhouses, they use the sun.
Fert's are generally like what we often use.
The key difference is most are in either mist houses or grown emergent. Some
are covered with plastic to increase humidity etc.

A few have ponds and can grow things that don't do well emergent, like coon
tail/Anachrais/Egeria/Lilies/Hygrophila/Cabomba etc. And these are all easy
to grow plants underwater as well.......

Tissue culture is another area but is labor intensive per unit plant. But it
takes little space, cool white lighting is used, sucrose agar gel nutrient
media etc. There might be a few folks growing TC plants in the USA but few
and I only know researchers personally.
Most folks just have ponds and they grow the plants in there or green
houses. 

See Tropica's site etc for some pics of what it's like.
A few places do use flow through trofts with semi FW or from a reservoir.
Hydroponics works pretty well also.

Regards, 
Tom Barr    

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