Nymphaea species

To: Aquatic-Plants at actwin_com
Subject: Nymphaea species
From: "shaji (s.) bhaskar" <bhaskar at bnr_ca>
Date: Sat, 8 Apr 1995 16:06:00 -0400
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>From: Erik Olson <olson at phys_washington.edu>
>David Webb Writes:
>> BTW, I was reading in your setup description about your Nymphaea.
>> Have you had any more success with them?  I purchased two african
>> water lillies (red) a few weeks ago and they haven't done a lot
>> yet.  My aponogeton crispus, on the other hand, are flowering.
>
>Nope.  Nymphaea is one I've had a big total of ONE happy plant and 
>nothing but failures since.  The stems either get nibbled off by the 
>fish, or the leaves die on their own.

I've had quite good success with water lilies.  I bought some generic
"Nymphaea species" bulbs from Walmart, and they did well enough that
the bulbs grew much larger.  I finally sold off the whole lot at an
auction.

I currently have a single red spatterdock that I bought oh, maybe 
three years ago.  I really like this one, it tends to stay submerged, 
unlike most water lilies that I tried.

Lilies are often seasonal, that could be why you (David) don't see
much growth right now.

As a side note - it is interesting that Erik and I seem to have
difficulty with different species of plants, even though we both have
CO2 injection.  My Giant Hygro (Nomaphila stricta) and lilies grow
like weeds, but Erik seems to have trouble with them.  I have very
little success with Alternanthera, but seem to remember that Erik said
he had good luck with them.  CO2 and substrate heaters, it seems, are
not the answer to all aquatic gardening problems.

-Shaji