Hi all,
First post from a former lurker, avid reader, with many tanks full of weeds and assorted fish.
Last summer, I noticed a fresh wad of marsh pennywort (hydrocotyle ranunculoides) that was jammed under one of the rollers on my neighbors boat trailer, just back from a fishing trip on the sac/sj delta. It was literally crawling with water critters, mostly scuds. I tossed it in my front yard (ex-koi) pond. The gambusia were overjoyed.
A few months later it had taken off. I snipped off a couple strands and dropped them in a 33 gallon open top, lo-tech tank, raised the lights up a bit.
It looks great as a floater in an open top tank. The petioles reorient themselves after the first day or two and stand up 6-8" above the water, reaching for the lights, the white dangling roots and green stems are great hiding places for fry. I chase the back end of of the floating strands every couple weeks, as they get "stalky". Sailfin mollies, flag fish, plecos don't bother it.
I've been searching around for a while and have yet to find much aquarium related information on hydrocotyle ranunculoides.
My question is:
Will it grow submersed?
Anyone have any experience growing this plant fully submersed, either lo-tech, or CO2 enriched, etc.? I have visions of long strands wrapped artfully around some long bogwood branches in the background of a future tank.
Floating marsh pennywort, juvenile flag fish, with duckweed (flag fish food):
Happy flag fish in root wad:
Thanks,
Rick
First post from a former lurker, avid reader, with many tanks full of weeds and assorted fish.
Last summer, I noticed a fresh wad of marsh pennywort (hydrocotyle ranunculoides) that was jammed under one of the rollers on my neighbors boat trailer, just back from a fishing trip on the sac/sj delta. It was literally crawling with water critters, mostly scuds. I tossed it in my front yard (ex-koi) pond. The gambusia were overjoyed.
A few months later it had taken off. I snipped off a couple strands and dropped them in a 33 gallon open top, lo-tech tank, raised the lights up a bit.
It looks great as a floater in an open top tank. The petioles reorient themselves after the first day or two and stand up 6-8" above the water, reaching for the lights, the white dangling roots and green stems are great hiding places for fry. I chase the back end of of the floating strands every couple weeks, as they get "stalky". Sailfin mollies, flag fish, plecos don't bother it.
I've been searching around for a while and have yet to find much aquarium related information on hydrocotyle ranunculoides.
My question is:
Will it grow submersed?
Anyone have any experience growing this plant fully submersed, either lo-tech, or CO2 enriched, etc.? I have visions of long strands wrapped artfully around some long bogwood branches in the background of a future tank.
Floating marsh pennywort, juvenile flag fish, with duckweed (flag fish food):
Happy flag fish in root wad:
Thanks,
Rick