# Ethan's Wabi Kusa Attempts



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Hey everyone! 

Been a while but things have certainly changed.

I'll have more pictures tomorrow but here's a little teaser taken with my phone...

Bacopa flowered! :biggrin:


----------



## thefishnoob (Jul 12, 2014)

I feel bad no one replied!! Lol. It looks great. Ill look forward to your progress!


----------



## Emplanted (May 3, 2014)

So cool! I love the idea. I'll be watching too see how it goes I'd love to set one up 
How wet was the soil? Just like a dsm?


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

thefishnoob said:


> I feel bad no one replied!! Lol. It looks great. Ill look forward to your progress!


Haha, no worries. People have been looking, so that's something at least. And thanks!



Emplanted said:


> So cool! I love the idea. I'll be watching too see how it goes I'd love to set one up
> How wet was the soil? Just like a dsm?


Thanks! I loved the idea too, so I jumped in head-first. :hihi:

I'll admit I had the soil too wet at first... :icon_redf I've never done DSM before either, so I didn't really know. What I've found works well for keeping things mold/algae free is similar to DSM, keeping the water level 2-3 cm below the line of the soil. I've also been misting once in the mornings with some tank water from one of my EI dosed tanks.

I don't think the misting is necessary though except at the beginning. I was away in SF for a week until Thursday and all I did before I left was top the water off, then left it 3/4 covered with saran wrap and things actually seemed better than they were when I left, haha. Guess the watched pot never boils...or the overly attended Wabi never sprouts? :icon_lol:


----------



## aquarist (Aug 29, 2012)

This is an awesome thread! Don't know how I missed it. I have been wanting to do a Wabi Kusa for a while now. I am I. The designing process. I see you did kinda an emersed setup, did you try to make any of the wabi kusa balls? If so how did it go?


----------



## mistuhmarc (Oct 1, 2013)

I've been wanting to do a wabi kusa for some time now. I love the way your bowls are looking now, very colorful!


----------



## Jalopy (Aug 11, 2013)

Both bowls look great. I'm up in Northern California and I find that with our dry weather, some things died when I stopped misting every day. I was misting twice a day to help with the transition but all of my stem plants died (limnophila aromatica, rotala colorata). The only thing that's growing now are my four leaf clovers and anchor moss. Good luck though. Keep us updated. The reason I stopped misting was because the wabi kusa was supposed to be a low maintenance centerpiece and twice a day of misting did not seem low maintenance to me.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

aquarist said:


> This is an awesome thread! Don't know how I missed it. I have been wanting to do a Wabi Kusa for a while now. I am I. The designing process. I see you did kinda an emersed setup, did you try to make any of the wabi kusa balls? If so how did it go?


I haven't yet tried to make the wabi ball. I would like to, but it's a bit more of an involved process. I enjoy the aspects of designing in an aquascape, so the idea that I can do little mini setups without the work of maintaining a tank was appealing. I have mostly just been taking trimmings from my other tanks, so not much money spent other than the glass containers.

I guess technically these are not wabi-kusa in the sense of the Amano Wabis, with the ball and what-not, but the idea is similar.



mistuhmarc said:


> I've been wanting to do a wabi kusa for some time now. I love the way your bowls are looking now, very colorful!


They're fun little experiments! The color is a result of the submersed growth, really. Most of it goes away or at least changes a bit from that when grown above water.



Jalopy said:


> Both bowls look great. I'm up in Northern California and I find that with our dry weather, some things died when I stopped misting every day. I was misting twice a day to help with the transition but all of my stem plants died (limnophila aromatica, rotala colorata). The only thing that's growing now are my four leaf clovers and anchor moss. Good luck though. Keep us updated. The reason I stopped misting was because the wabi kusa was supposed to be a low maintenance centerpiece and twice a day of misting did not seem low maintenance to me.


Yeah, I've been experiencing some issues keeping the shallow bowl humid enough lately. It had been humid around hear for a few weeks, but recently it's been drying out a bit. The taller bowl is doing fine though, holds in the humidity much better. I'll probably be able to keep the saran wrap off it permanently in a week or so. I noticed initially there's a pretty substantial die-back of the submersed growth, but most of the stems I just left in and in a week or so they had resprouted. Some definitely didn't make it though...like the hygro pinnatafida, which was a shame. I'm hoping mine will be good in a few weeks when they've thoroughly rooted themselves.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

*Update!*

Hey everyone!

As promised I have pictures of the bowls! 

Here is the shallow bowl


The HC is starting to grow in nicely, and that bacopa is growing like mad. The hydrocotyle tripartita (sp japan) is doing great too!


Some ludwigia sp. red in the back, hoping it grows a little taller but it's quite slow-growing. I believe that's rotala indica next to it there that's doing well. I don't remember what the fuzzy one is on the right that's struggling...


Shot of the alternanthera reineckii which looks pretty cool, nice burgundy leaves. The bacopa flowers have since shriveled up, which is too bad. Maybe I'll get some more though! :icon_surp


And now the taller bowl, which is my favorite at the moment (mainly cause it's growing better, haha). I did suffer a complete loss of all the HC due to the white/yellow spider-web like mold. It took the whole lot in only a few days which is as impressive as it was disappointing.  But from the ashes rose a nice mat of hydrocotyle tripartita that's doing quite well.




As you can see, the plants in this one are doing much better. (other than that bacopa in the other one, haha) I think the taller bowl really helps with the humidity, it's also deeper soil which probably helps. The moss on the wood hasn't really done anything, it's not dead, but it hasn't spread or really grown out at all.




Close up of the alternanthera reineckii, proserpinica palustris, and...the fuzzy one all doing great! It looks like the proserpinia has some flower buds on it?


Here's the ludwigia repens sp rubin on the left, which is another good one. It has grown all the way from one side of the bowl to the other and is now going vertical. Not as red in it's above-water form, but I still like it. Next to it there is hygrophilla polysperma (I think), that's also doing really well.


And finally, I set up one more. Going for a little iwagumi style here with the glass cube. I used a couple large lava rocks to make some boulders, amazonia powder for scaling. HC on top trailing down between the boulders with some hydrocotyle tripartita mixed in. Also some staurogyne repens on the bottom. The left boulder has some moss covering it, I believe it's java with some fissidens mixed in. Then there's a little moss wrapped around the bottom half of the other boulder. It's about 4 inches high in back and about 1 inch in the front.

Front:


Top:


Alright, thanks for hanging in there everyone! Hope you like them! I think the taller bowl is going to end up on my desk at work soon, so I'm excited for that!

Oops, forgot to mention, all of these are grown using a desk lamp that has a 100W equivalent, 6500K CFL on for 14 hours a day!


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Yay! More flowers! :bounce:

This time it's the proserpinaca! :icon_mrgr


----------



## Jalopy (Aug 11, 2013)

That's awesome. I'm going to copy you and add a lot more dirt. I just had water on the bottom of mine but maybe the dirt is better at controlling humidity?


----------



## Big O (Jun 28, 2011)

*Really nice!*

I wish!


----------



## Aplomado (Feb 20, 2013)

Excellent job! I am impressed!


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Jalopy said:


> That's awesome. I'm going to copy you and add a lot more dirt. I just had water on the bottom of mine but maybe the dirt is better at controlling humidity?


Haha, thanks! They're fun! I don't know that the dirt (or in my case amazonia) does much for humidity control. I think it's the taller glass that really helps. So if you're in a dry climate, you may struggle with something like this without high rimmed bowls/containers. I see you're in the Bay area so you might be able to do a shallow bowl like the second one I made without too much trouble. I'm at the point now where I don't keep the saran on there much at all, just lay it over top in the morning then uncover it at night. Also do a misting in the morning.



Big O said:


> I wish!


Haha, right? It would be nice if more soil helped. I think what it does really help with is the stems. They have more space to fill their roots in.



Aplomado said:


> Excellent job! I am impressed!


Thank you! I appreciate the compliment!


----------



## thebuddha (Jul 16, 2012)

very cool! love the tall bowl


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

thebuddha said:


> very cool! love the tall bowl


Thanks! I like the tall one too, that's why it's ending up on my desk at work. Hopefully the lamp won't be too annoying to have on the desk with it...


----------



## Dan110024 (Jul 14, 2014)

I think I know where my left over trimmings are going to go haha


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Dan110024 said:


> I think I know where my left over trimmings are going to go haha


Yeah, you should try it! I'm doing a big trim in my large tank this weekend, so I'll probably be setting up the 4th of these things. This one might be an actual wabi kusa, with the ball and everything, instead of just an emmersed-like setup.


----------



## Tributary (Jun 30, 2014)

This is really neat. Way to go!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Tributary said:


> This is really neat. Way to go!
> 
> Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I997 using Tapatalk 2


Thanks!


----------



## Carrie.a.gordon (Mar 16, 2011)

Awesome! Now I have something new to try to do.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Carrie.a.gordon said:


> Awesome! Now I have something new to try to do.


Yeah, give it a shot! I've enjoyed watching them grow!

The proserpinaca is flowering like crazy! It's got little buds shooting out all up and down the stem! It's awesome getting to see the growth, much faster than submersed, IMO.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Got the large bowl moved onto my desk at work today! Looking pretty good! We'll see what my boss has to say about it on Monday, haha. :icon_neut

Please ignore the stack of papers... :icon_redf


----------



## Raymond S. (Dec 29, 2012)

As you know, it boils down to...if they have a reason...then they need an excuse.
I have had human bosses, but most have been normal ones...LOL...
I could picture myself sayig to an employee...
A pesonal decoration(depending on the kind) to me means that you are comfortable in your job. A good all around sign. Looks great. But I just would like to mention that I will be more than pleased as long as the garden doesn't become a farm." 
But that would make me human and I guess that's why I'm not a boss...LOL...


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Raymond S. said:


> As you know, it boils down to...if they have a reason...then they need an excuse.
> I have had human bosses, but most have been normal ones...LOL...
> I could picture myself sayig to an employee...
> A pesonal decoration(depending on the kind) to me means that you are comfortable in your job. A good all around sign. Looks great. But I just would like to mention that I will be more than pleased as long as the garden doesn't become a farm."
> But that would make me human and I guess that's why I'm not a boss...LOL...


Hahaha, luckily my office is pretty cool. There are already several plants on other desks. Just none with a lamp above them, haha. My corner is way too dark though, that thing wouldn't make it.

My boss usually doesn't care about too much as long as it's not affecting other people's work. I mean, I have a bunch of cigar bands pinned on my desk too which he hasn't made me take down in 3 years now, so I think it'll be ok. Undoubtedly he will comment, haha, he's never the type to remain silent in situations like this. It's more his reaction I'm curious about.

So I guess he's...part human?


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Now, I'm sure many of you at home have been looking through this wonderful thread thinking, "How on Earth can he say 'wabi kusa' when he hasn't even made a true wabi kusa?!" 

Fear not, I have heard your silent cries of discontent and logged them accordingly. And in due time, you will have your wabis.

Keep posted.


----------



## Zorfox (Jun 24, 2012)

I like them! The fuzzy one could be water wisteria (Hygrophila difformis). The growth looks completely different emmersed. The new growth resembles submersed but later changes. The flowers will be purple.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Zorfox said:


> I like them! The fuzzy one could be water wisteria (Hygrophila difformis). The growth looks completely different emmersed. The new growth resembles submersed but later changes. The flowers will be purple.


You are correct! I didn't update that part, but I know now that the fuzzy one you refer to is hygrophila difformis sp variegated. The newest growth more shows the variegated leaves. That one hasn't flowered yet, but I hope it will!


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

*Finally got around to it...*

Ok everyone, finally got around to getting some true Wabi Kusa balls made! :icon_mrgr I did a pseudo progress with pictures...but once your hands get messy it's hard to keep taking photos, haha.

Before we start, I will update on the last emmersed, terrarium-like setup I did, it's grown in well but I just don't like the look... I used about half the plants here to put into the wabis and I'll figure out what to do with the rest... Anyway, here are the pictures of that before I tore it apart.





Anyway, now onto the real wabis!

For the balls I used some MGOP as a base, added some dry peat moss for more filler, added a little bit of sphagnum moss as filler, and finally some extra aquasoil. 



Added water until it "squishes" when squeezed and retains its shape nicely.



I made 3 total, of different sizes, and initially wrapped them in sphagnum moss with tons of fishing line...



...But decided to strip that off and just use a huge hunk of java moss I had from when I tore down and revamped my 40 gallon. I know now why people don't really like java moss for driftwood applications...it's so stringy...but grown terrestrially, I think it looks fine.

And then I went to town stuffing stems in those bad boys!

Got various ludwigia, some limnophila, hygrophila, hydrocotyle, HC, s repens, some myrio (that I hope survives), and probably some more that I'm forgetting. Layed down some gravel in a glass cube and BAM! roud:





I'll be moving them to separate containers, but I lost steam last night so I'll take care of that tonight. Hoping to put them in three different containers and different accent substrates.

Apologies for the delay in posting pictures, I've been quite busy as of late...

Thanks as always for looking and comments are welcome!


----------



## aquarist (Aug 29, 2012)

Looks great! I've a little extra aqua soil and plan on making a ball at some point this winter when I've some spare time.


----------



## Gravistunn (Aug 8, 2014)

So all you used to bind this together was Java moss? I read through this and it's was really interesting with a lot of info regarding the composition of the original Wabi Kusa ball ( http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...e/76538-secret-ada-wabi-kusa-they-filled.html ).


~Travis


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

aquarist said:


> Looks great! I've a little extra aqua soil and plan on making a ball at some point this winter when I've some spare time.


Thanks! Yeah, I find this little projects lots of fun. They don't take too much effort and now that I mostly know what to do with the emmersed growth, aren't that difficult to grow. Plus once they get settled in they are real easy to take care of and make nice table pieces! Or desk pieces, haha. I think it's well worth giving it a shot.



Gravistunn said:


> So all you used to bind this together was Java moss? I read through this and it's was really interesting with a lot of info regarding the composition of the original Wabi Kusa ball ( http://www.aquaticplantcentral.com/...e/76538-secret-ada-wabi-kusa-they-filled.html ).
> 
> 
> ~Travis


Haha, I've read that exact thread. Very informative indeed! I found the rocks thing interesting. Since (at least originally) the Amano Wabi Kusa balls were meant to give you the instant "grown in" planted look in a new aquarium, I assume the rocks were there to keep the things from floating when the aquarium was filled. Perhaps they are there to keep things more open for roots, but the mud (at least mine) is quite soft so I think the roots will grow fine.

And to answer your question, yes, just java moss...LOTS of java moss, haha. I mean, I probably had a softball size clump of the stuff. I don't think it would have worked well if I only had a small amount of moss, I would have needed the sphagnum to keep things together at that point. Otherwise the ball is just going to slowly disintegrate in the water. I'll keep an eye on it if it seems like it's falling apart I'll have to more or less start over and reattach the sphagnum.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

I do enjoy having this at my desk at work... nice to be sipping the morning coffee, thinking all sciencey while checking out the plants.



And then we have this guy trying to crawl away...



I will be moving the wabis over to a small rimless tank I ordered later this week, they're a little cramped in that cube. I'll get updated pictures when that all happens.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Snapped a couple pictures here at work on my phone. Just a few of the flowers currently blooming. The hygrophila polysperma has fun little flowering stalks all over it. I can count 13 at the moment! Here's a close up I'm particular proud of my phone for capturing, haha.



And finally, something I didn't even know flowered, hydrocotyle tripartita (sp japan)!!!!

Tiny, itty bitty little white/yellow flowers!


I really need to wipe the inside of the bowl...

Looks like the hygrophila "sp bold" is also about to bloom. I think hygros are officially some of my favorite plants to grow like this just cause of the flowers.


----------



## Zorfox (Jun 24, 2012)

Wait until you see the difformis bloom. They look like miniature orchids.


----------



## Tiptop (Apr 15, 2013)

Very cool bowls and wabis! You might have maybe convinced me to make one.


----------



## ChemGuyEthan (Apr 13, 2014)

Zorfox said:


> Wait until you see the difformis bloom. They look like miniature orchids.


Oh wow, got me excited for this, haha.



Tiptop said:


> Very cool bowls and wabis! You might have maybe convinced me to make one.


Yeah man, put those riparium skills to good use, haha.

I'll hopefully be getting the wabis moved into the tank I got online. It's a little 2.5 gallon Finnex low-iron tank. Really quite a nice tank, and at $28 shipped it wasn't a tough purchase to make!


----------

