# Jungle Val growth rate?



## GoodwillTKE (Dec 30, 2010)

I put in several plants of jungle val when I started my 75 galon tank, as I read they would grow at a decent rate at low-medium light and would make a nice back ground plant, however, they don't really seem to be growing at all. All the other plants in my tank including crypt wendtii, wisteria, java fern, apponogeton, chain swords, and DHG have all grown very noticably in the 6 weeks or so the tank has been running.

I have bene running 3 T5NO bulbs, and add ferts once a week, no CO2. Substrate is a layer of flourite topped by small gravel. The only thing the vals seem to have done is send out runners and spawn lots of small plants, but none of them have noticably increased in size anything like the rest of my plants.

Anyone have any ideas?


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## swoof (Jun 30, 2010)

Are you sure it's Jungle and not corcksrew or another variety? I have one big Jungle in my tank that i can't get to do runners. The leaves grow nice and long, untill trimming last night i had a couple close to 20" long. How much Iron are you dosing, and are you using Excel? I keep hearing Val doesn't do well with excel.


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## xmas_one (Feb 5, 2010)

What's the temperature? Ive noticed that they grow much faster in warmer water...


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## GoodwillTKE (Dec 30, 2010)

Not dosing excel.

Iron wise I have what's in the flourite, plus whatever I get in additional from my weekly csm+b dose which is 1/8 tsp I think (at work, so I don't have my notes)

The tank temp runs pretty steady at about 78 F.

As for the variety, I really can't say other than it was sold to me as Jungle Val from the LFS. From what I have seen, they are usually good with their plant IDs. 

I'll try to get a picture if I can, although you should be able to see them in the link in my sig. I havn't updated it in a while though.


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## xmas_one (Feb 5, 2010)

I didn't see anything in your sig link that even resembled a jungle/giant val.


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## GoodwillTKE (Dec 30, 2010)

They were small plants when I bought them, along the back wall. Maybe they are not the right plant then.


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## xmas_one (Feb 5, 2010)

Yeah, even when they are short the blades should be at least as wide as your thumb. If you can't find any local, I can send you a few shoots..


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## scags (Sep 22, 2003)

I get explosive growth from my jungle vals. I did notice though that Excel will kill them. 

Another thing, it took mine a good month after buying them before they started growing. They need to get established before they start sending new shoots.


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## GoodwillTKE (Dec 30, 2010)

If these are indeed not jungle val, I guess i need to figure out what they are. I am planning out a rescape for this tank, and actually trying to figure out where to put things this time around instead of just placing all similar types of plants together. 

I am not dead set on having the jungle val, I kind of just got them to see what they were like since they were supposed to be easy to grow. More research after the purchase lead me to think true Jungle val may be a little big for my 20" high tank :icon_redf. I am learning quite a bit as I go here.

I will try to get an updated photo tonight so that if it turns out I have something different than what I thought , I can figure out what to do with it....


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## JasonG75 (Mar 1, 2011)

I see what you're speaking of against the back wall.

Really Vals only need DECENT lighting and Nitrates, so check those. 

I can tell you that it does (from my experiance) to time for them to establish. Mine grew more east to west (shoots) and I would cut them. After several months of cutting the shoots they decided to go NORTH and there was no stopping them


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## boringname (Nov 11, 2010)

I wonder if its a ph issue. Vals are mostly found in hard, alkaline water in nature. If you want a Val like plant for soft, acidic water then get Sags.


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## wobbler (Nov 4, 2010)

My jungle val is very odd. Sometimes it grows like crazy, other times it doesn't. For the past few months my jungle val has been pretty static and has not grown much. 

I did read that if the tops of each piece of grass are broken that the particular piece of grass will not grow anymore. That might be something to consider.


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## Johny_Dough (Nov 30, 2010)

wobbler said:


> My jungle val is very odd. Sometimes it grows like crazy, other times it doesn't. For the past few months my jungle val has been pretty static and has not grown much.
> 
> I did read that if the tops of each piece of grass are broken that the particular piece of grass will not grow anymore. That might be something to consider.


Not true in my tank. It took a month before any real growth but now I trim them all weekly to the water line. By the end of the week they reach down the tank 30' and across 24'. FYI I have been hitting this tank with Excel to try and get some algae under control. Haven't notice any change with the Jungle Val.


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## GoodwillTKE (Dec 30, 2010)

Well, life got in the way last night and I was not able to get any time to work on the tank.

My tank water is pH of 7.4 and gH of 9-10, so I wouldn't think the issue would be having too soft and acidic water. I havn't trimmed them yet, so that's out. Light should be fine, as I was running 3 T5NO bulbs, but had to cut back to 2 recently to combat algea. Nitrates vary between 10-30 over the week as I dose trace Saturday and macros Sunday.

I am going to start a rescape up in this tank this weekend so I can get things moved around before my dwarf cories come out of QT so I don't hurt anyone moving drift wood around. 

While I am at it, I am going to trim off the runners, and make sure I haven't planted the plants in too deeply when I move them. I read else where that this may cause growth problems. I re-adjusted the planting depth for a few other plants last week, and that seemed to help them a bit so I'll try it with the vals. Maybe it will help, or maybe they just need a little more time. We shall see I guess.

Thanks for all the feedback gang.


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## roadmaster (Nov 5, 2009)

GoodwillTKE said:


> I put in several plants of jungle val when I started my 75 galon tank, as I read they would grow at a decent rate at low-medium light and would make a nice back ground plant, however, they don't really seem to be growing at all. All the other plants in my tank including crypt wendtii, wisteria, java fern, apponogeton, chain swords, and DHG have all grown very noticably in the 6 weeks or so the tank has been running.
> 
> I have bene running 3 T5NO bulbs, and add ferts once a week, no CO2. Substrate is a layer of flourite topped by small gravel. The only thing the vals seem to have done is send out runners and spawn lots of small plants, but none of them have noticably increased in size anything like the rest of my plants.
> 
> Anyone have any ideas?


I would give them more time. I planted leopard vals in 80 gal low tech with weekly KNO3 1/2 tsp, KH2PO4 1/2 tsp, and 1/2 tsp CSM+B.
pH and hardness same as yours, and plant's didn't do much for a close to three months under T8 lighting. They then just took off and six months later,,,I'm cutting the tips near the surface every couple weeks.


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## JasonG75 (Mar 1, 2011)

You pretty much have the same readings I have for my setup with vals.

pH 7.2
Gh 9
KH 8

I would trim the runners and try to centralize your vals to one area.


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