[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
Re: Aquatic Plants Digest V3 #696
Karen wrote:
> Thanks for the input, Ed. I'm interested to hear of your crosses. I think
> you've mentioned them before, but I have to admit that it went in on ear
> (eye?<g>) and out the other because I haven't worked much with Aponos for a
> number of years. (so many plants...so little tank space<sigh>)
>
> Do your hybrids have tubers like the crispus parent or a rhizome like the
> rigidifolia? My plant has a definite rhizome, with leaves spread along the
> length. Like other rhizome plants, new leaves tend to come on the growing
> ends of the rhizome.
What I believe to be the A. rigidifolius - A. crispus cross has a very
small thin rhizome, looks like a short piece of stick. However,
although the leaves are long and many, it is still a young plant so it
may be too soon to tell what the root stock will eventually look like,
it could be the beginnings of a tuber . There is, growing next to it, a
plant about the same age, that looks like an A. crispus - A. ulvaceus
cross with long, wider leaves that are also at the top of the tank, that
has not as yet developed a bulb _or_ rhizome, just a large root mass.
The plant that puts up the two different colored flowers, white and
purple, with the wide, dark green to reddish brown, slightly undulating,
long leaves has a round bulb.
There is one other plant probably an A. ulvaceus cross that has a large
tuber. It recently came out of dormancy putting up a lot of
inflorescence, but little in the way of leaves until I pulled the tuber
up toward the surface of the gravel, now it has begun to put up short,
wide, light green leaves, that if memory serves will start to take over
that end of the tank <g>. The plant described above, with the purple
flowers, also recently emerged from dormancy.
> As I mentioned in my last post, the information in various books is very
> variable. One source said that sexual propagation was "hardly possible".
> Maybe you're having better luck because yours _is_ a hybrid.
Probably. I don't think I can say for sure if i've ever had a non
hybridized Aponogeton.
>The one thing that all seem to agree on is that it doesn't undergo a rest period >the way most non-hybridized tuber growing Aponos do.
That also seems to be the case with the A. rigidifolius hybrid described
above. It has been growing for well more than a year and has yet to go
dormant. But I understand that is not uncommon for the Apons we usually
see due to the unnatural selection pressure of the aquarium trade.
> One thing I can already say is that this is going to be one massive plant.
> The new leaves are already at the top of my 70G tank.
Like I said, I end up giving them away <G>. The last one was to our
annual auction where the auctioneer put a tape measure to it for
emphasis.<G>
Ed Hengel
AGA