# Plants practically in my back yard..who knew



## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Wonder no more, we are in plant heaven...

FL native and invasive species

With any luck, I'll be landing a job in invasive aquatic control soon, and will be able to snag quite a few more species on the list. There are quite a few "terrestrial" bog species or emergent form photos included on that page, but if you have a handle on genus names, you should be able to browse through the list and surprise yourself. Most of what we have outside looks completely different there than it does in our tanks. Now might not be the best time to go searching for some since you'll be gauging some species more off of it's inflorescence rather than the rest of the plant structure.


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## Green Leaf Aquariums (Feb 26, 2007)

Any pictures of these?


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## JenThePlantGeek (Mar 27, 2006)

You guys down south are so lucky!!!

I hear stories about people collecting in the drainage ditches and surrounding lakes near plant and fish nurseries - you might give that a shot too :hihi:


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Orlando said:


> Any pictures of these?


I can take some pics..sure. Oh yeah, there was something in the plants that was swimming around very fast, about the size of an amphipod. Any clue what they might be?


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

jaidexl said:


> Wonder no more, we are in plant heaven...
> 
> FL native and invasive species
> 
> With any luck, I'll be landing a job in invasive aquatic control soon, and will be able to snag quite a few more species on the list. There are quite a few "terrestrial" bog species or emergent form photos included on that page, but if you have a handle on genus names, you should be able to browse through the list and surprise yourself. Most of what we have outside looks completely different there than it does in our tanks. Now might not be the best time to go searching for some since you'll be gauging some species more off of it's inflorescence rather than the rest of the plant structure.


Thanks for all the info. I will check out the link and take some pics. It should be fun to see what I found.:icon_smil Good luck getting the job. Will you get to drive an airboat? Airboats~funny things they are. Someone told me once, you Florida people are weird...you have trucks to run in the water, and boats that can drive on land...:hihi:


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

jaidexl said:


> Wonder no more, we are in plant heaven...
> 
> FL native and invasive species
> 
> .


 LOL...that's a long list..:icon_eek:


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

LOL! So true! The Florida cracker is a curious species for sure. 

I think the place I'll be going to next is mainly dealing with small boats in ponds at the local golf courses, spraying herbicides. They're also located in Orlando, Lake Masters Aquatic Weed Control. There was a state job I almost got that entailed walking around in the marshes and estuaries with a canister of herbicide, also some controlled burning. No airboats that I've heard of, but I'm sure if I venture out to the Everglades National Park, then swamp buggies and airboats will be a required thing. :hihi:


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

waterfaller1 said:


> about the size of an amphipod


could have been some sort of pod or aquatic insect. Or aliens.

I can tell you that they don't survive well in a closed system like the scrap/grow buckets I keep locals in.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Hmm..well there is four of them in there that I saw, maybe more. I kept thinking it would be weird if a fish hatched out of the plants, but without filtration..not likely.



JenThePlantGeek said:


> You guys down south are so lucky!!!
> 
> I hear stories about people collecting in the drainage ditches and surrounding lakes near plant and fish nurseries - you might give that a shot too :hihi:


Well..looking quickly at the list that jaidexl posted, and how many of the ones that are here are not native species, I'll bet you have plenty near you. I would be too afraid to put them in my 'good' tanks though, after seeing the critters swimming around in them.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

I just QT them in the buckets for awhile, at the very least, you are going to bring in a bunch of pond snails. So, any time you can find something emergent, there's going to be less chance of bringing in unwanted hitchhikers. The main things you want to look out for are fish parasites, which are always on fish, so just don't bring in any scaled critters. Everything else is just feeding off diatoms, detritus, infusoria etc.

I still haven't transfered any locals to my display tanks yet, mainly because I never get around to giving them the attention they need to acclimate to indoor living, so they end up getting algae ridden in the buckets. Maybe some day soon I'll set up a dedicated local grow tank with proper lighting CO2 etc. 

One that you can easily get emergent is the local Hydrocotyle, which I believe is H. umbelata. It grows far enough away from water to infest many peoples' front yards. Just be sure to wash off any potential pesticides, yard ferts or herbicides. Bacopa monnieri is often emergent as well.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Pond snails would be a good thing since it's a snail farm..:icon_smil Thanks for all your info. Where did you learn all this stuff?


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Just digging and digging through different sites, PDFs, and rummaging around in mud. 

Keep your eyes pealed for flat clusters of green plants with little red flowers growing on wet land near ponds, you might get lucky and find Drosera capillaris, a carnivorous sun dew. That's one of the coolest things I've found here so far, over in Brevard county in the pine swamps.


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## RTC 307 (Nov 22, 2007)

ya. ive been going to the creek in my neighborhood and there is all types of stuff. anarchis and other stuff there is the stuff that just covers the ground and it is bright green. i will try to find out what it is.


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## esteroali (Oct 24, 2007)

*Recent South Florida finds......*

Found this in the swamp yesterday. Looks great in the tank so far..._Proserpinaca palustris


This second is from a pond that used to be a freshwater spring that was capped off years ago by the state..I am guessing __Bacopa monnieri...


The third I have no clue. It looks like a mini L.repens.Maybe __Ludwigia palustris
Here it is emersed....

And here it is immersed and doing great....


This is the stuff that really intrigues me..ANY ID'S???
Emersed.......

And immersed.........


The last two are WAY smaller than the L.Repens that is everywhere. Does anyone know what __Lindernia dubia is or have you found it? It looks like a lot of the plants in the pond.
_


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## Urkevitz (Jan 12, 2004)

My neighbor had Ludwigia palustris in her flower garden, I told her she was water too much.


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## python (Mar 21, 2007)

I've found anacharis, bacopa caroliniana, and a pretty red stem species in the lakes around my house


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## Green Leaf Aquariums (Feb 26, 2007)

This is great all these cool finds. Florida has tons of aquatic plants, you just have to know where to look. Springs,ponds,creeks and rivers. I know the Econ river has tons of plants in it that Ive collected when I lived there. I cant wait to go to the springs this weekend.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

And the rivers run out to the ocean 

I've been trying to grow shoal grass, but I need to setup the proper tank. This macroalgae and mangrove is all local...


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

esteroali said:


> Found this in the swamp yesterday. Looks great in the tank so far..._Proserpinaca palustris
> 
> 
> 
> ...


_This is sweet! I gotta find that, where abouts did you find it?

We're all gonna have to invest in some GPS. :biggrin:

The third definitely looks like Ludwigia to me. The last one might be Micranthemum, maybe, I'm not too familiar with that one yet. I need to get back out there! Ludwigia acruata is everywhere!_


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

I like that last one too.:icon_cool


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

hey waterfaller; didnt know you were a member here too (this is the same marko as that on UB). i have quite a few streams in the area, but they are fast cold water with no plant life at all apart from hair algae in the summer. i did however catch a newt there (released it back though). your lucky you can get such stuff for free at a pond, i just payed a few bucks for cambomba a few days ago.


this post has little info on anything, but i just had to say hi.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Hi Marko, good to talk to you here..welcome. 
When I was a kid{in NJ}, I spent many hours wading through the neat little backwoods streams up there. We used to see newts in the woods in PA. They called them red-F's..because they had a red 'f' on their tummy. Here we have lots of different types of reptiles. There are real pretty blue tailed skinks here, they look slick/shiny. I am not certain of my ID of Cabomba. It looks different, now that I took a closer look.I will work on some pics tomorrow and maybe someone can ID some of them.


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

here i find mainly little black ones, once i found a poisonous bright orange one (only harmful if consumed or slime coat gets into bloodstream though), and garders. 

ill try and help you id the cambomba if i can. it would be cool if it were cambomba fructa (the red one) but i doubt it.


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## matt s (Jun 6, 2007)

I have found 200+ stems of red ludwiga in the ponds behind my house.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

waterfaller1 said:


> Hi Marko, good to talk to you here..welcome.
> When I was a kid{in NJ}, I spent many hours wading through the neat little backwoods streams up there. We used to see newts in the woods in PA. They called them red-F's..because they had a red 'f' on their tummy. Here we have lots of different types of reptiles. There are real pretty blue tailed skinks here, they look slick/shiny. I am not certain of my ID of Cabomba. It looks different, now that I took a closer look.


Could be C. caroliniana or Limnophila sessiliflora, or maybe even Ceratophyllum demersum (hornnwort) or Myriophyllum aquaticum (parrot feather). Did you happen to catch what it looks like emergent? Check those out through that link and see what you think.


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

it could be asian ambulia instead. it has been labeled a federal noxious weed a while back, probably for a reason. its a great plant in tanks though, looks good and grows fast and helps outcompete algae.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

"Ceratophyllum demersum (hornnwort"..there is something in there that does look like this one. But the one I thought was cabomba looks different, finer. And there are nodules all over the leaves/stems. The tank is pretty cloudy today..bacterial bloom I suppose. I'll try for some pics if it clears later.


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

sounds just like asian ambulia with no CO2 (which it would not have in a pond).

does it look kinda like this:


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

This is the best I can do for now..


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## mrbelvedere (Nov 15, 2005)

Looks like you have a lot of Utricularia sp. in there. 

Could be U. vulgaris.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

HEY..that is it..bladderwort, hence the nodules I see. The one piece with the reddish stem does look like the hornwort.The piece up at the top left has the largest leaves, a reddish color to the whole thing. Then there are some that have nice small roundish green leaves & a thick stem, the stuff that looks like anacharis, but a tighter form, and this cool fine grass stuff, that grows like runners over to the next rooted piece. It has an umbrella shape.
note: the anubias was already in the tank.


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

are sure the thing that looks like hornwort is not foxtail, hornwort has green stems


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Common names are just plain confusing and half way useless. The hornwort here is Ceratophyllum demersum and is often called "coontail". What is the species name of foxtail? I always thought is was the same as hornwort, I've never kept either.

Edit: answered my own question, there are two Foxtail species I found on plantgeek.net that are in the Myriophyllum genus, 2 of them on the FL species list with the common name "water milfoil" as well as parrot feather in the same genus.

I can already tell that's a ID nightmare I am going to stay far away from. :hihi:


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

theres a big difference, mainly hornwort is a floating plant and has no roots. you can anchhor it, but it wont ever develop roots and if burried, the burried section will rot an dye.


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## Sandman333 (Dec 8, 2007)

This thread caught my attention; I have collected a couple plants from the Satellite Beach and UCF areas. 
Bacopa monnieri, a hair grass, what I believe to be Ludwigia Longifolia, and another unidentified (yet) Ludwigia. 
Pictures of the unidentified plant are attached. That portion of the stem is 4.5 inches long, and was found growing by a sidewalk at UCF.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

I grabbed a few things from the ditch about 500' from my door. Two submersed, Elodea canadensis and another that looks a tad like it but has much more slender leaves that are about three times as long. Also found more Bacopa monnieri.










Here's some unidentified emergent plants that were a few inches from the water. If I can ID them and find out they have a submersed form, I'm going to fully submerse them and see what happens. Anyone recognize them? I think I'm going to have to make a few more trips outside to ID these, they seem to be young and there wasn't any overgrown foliage along the ditch to help with the ID. For size reference, the plant pot is about 4 or 5" wide.




























This one is the most intriguing to me, I'm trying to ID it now but no dice so far...


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## Church (Sep 14, 2004)

This thread is awesome! I love living in Florida! 

Does anyone know which aquatic mosses grow native in Florida's rivers? I checked that link on page 1, but I can't find what I'm looking for... basically, I just went to Hillsborough River State Park recently, wading through the waters looking at our natural biotope, for some aquarium ideas, and I found the whole area was covered in this submerged moss-like plant... but I can't find out what it is! I will go back and take pictures if I can, but does anyone know what mosses grow locally here? It looked a lot like flame moss, but it didn't seem to grow like it. It almost looked "fern-like" in a way. But I'm pretty sure it is a moss.

Anyone?


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## Minsc (Jul 9, 2006)

The one on the bottom looks like it could be Ceratopteris richardii to me.

The only plants I've seen around my area are standard floaters, likely ambulia and foxtail and such, some standard pond weeds and what looks to be good old java moss


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Minsc said:


> The one on the bottom looks like it could be Ceratopteris richardii to me.


That's it, related to water sprite, woulda thought. I can find the aquatic forms of the other Ceratopteris species, but not this one... _"infrequently cultivated for aquaria"_, I wonder why. I read it's difficult to keep in an artificial setup, that goes against everything else I read about it being studied so much and even taken into space. I guess we'll just have to see what 200 watts of light and >30ppm CO2 does to it. 

Thanks for the info, Minsc!


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## Church (Sep 14, 2004)

jaidexl said:


> ...and even taken into space.


WHOA! Can you elaborate? I'd like to read more about this!


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

This is where I read it, http://fins.actwin.com/aquatic-plants/month.200108/msg00517.html

There's probably more info about that on c-fern.org, a site I just found that's devoted to Ceratopteris species.

_"Right now, the only way you can get C. richardii is by obtaining the spores
from a biological supply house"_ < Bwahahahaaa... NOT!


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Church said:


> It almost looked "fern-like" in a way. But I'm pretty sure it is a moss.
> 
> Anyone?


I'd like to see that stuff


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## Church (Sep 14, 2004)

^ Well I'll be going back soon, and I'll definitely take my camera with me. In fact, last time I went I *did* bring a camera with me, because I was specifically on a mission to research the Florida river biotope... but my girlfriend started having, um, "woman problems," when we got there, so she wasn't feeling good and it ended up distracting me from my mission.

So, I'll be going back, and I'll take pictures. All I know is that the stuff was ALL over the place! It was growing emersed as well as submerged. The way it was attached to the rocks I pulled out of the water was definitely moss-like in every way, but when I pulled "strands" of it out of the river that weren't attached to anything, it looked like extremely long strands of some kind of thin fern-like plant. I was actually convinced that it was flame moss! So much so that I immediately went home and looked up flame moss, only to find that it doesn't seem to be local to Florida, so I'm guessing that's not what it was. I'm pretty sure it is NOT java moss. But the problem is that java moss is the only aquatic moss I've seen up close, and I'm not much of a moss expert.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Cool, if you end up bringing a chunk back, I'll pay for some :biggrin: 

I don't even care if it's not moss, sounds cool enough.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Yay..I finally started a thread people are interested in..:biggrin: Your pics make mine look so sad...:icon_lol:


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## Daniel*Swords (May 8, 2006)

@[email protected] said:


> are sure the thing that looks like hornwort is not foxtail, hornwort has green stems


Are you sure? I've seen lots of hornwort with red stems. It seems to me that it'll grow like that in very high light - like outdoors - and other parameters may be involved, too. Took some of red-stemmed home and it grew green quite soon...

You guys are soooo lucky to be able to just go outside and collect. I'm so envious! :icon_eek:


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## mistergreen (Dec 9, 2006)

for you kids living in florida or anywhere really, this site is helpful for IDing plants.
http://aquat1.ifas.ufl.edu/


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Hey..how come noone warned me...
DO NOT Start trimming your tank on a monday morning when you have 10,000 other things you should be doing. I started at 8:30...

So are some of you saying that some plants can grow on land & under water? I have noticed something that looks like pennywort growing all around that lake. Please don't say 'yes'...you'll have me scrutinzing every plant & weed I see.:biggrin:


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## Church (Sep 14, 2004)

Can someone else besides me scan through that University of Florida web page that everyone keeps linking us to, and look for mosses of any kind? Is it just me, or are there no other mosses than Mayaca fluviatilis (which isn't even a moss-- it's a stem plant!) listed in that database? Does that mean there *are* no aquatic mosses native to Florida? What gives? The Hillsborough River was filled with this stuff, submerged and emersed, growing on the river bank and all, and yet I can't find a link anywhere about aquatic mosses in Florida rivers!

**edit**

I just stopped including the "florida rivers" part of my google search terms, and suddenly I'm finding lots of mosses that look like what I found! The closest one is "Fontinalis antipyretica," but that was from a Washington State website. But maybe what I've found is some kind of Fontinalis?


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## Algenco (May 10, 2007)

Church said:


> Can someone else besides me scan through that University of Florida web page that everyone keeps linking us to, and look for mosses of any kind? Is it just me, or are there no other mosses than Mayaca fluviatilis (which isn't even a moss-- it's a stem plant!) listed in that database? Does that mean there *are* no aquatic mosses native to Florida? What gives? The Hillsborough River was filled with this stuff, submerged and emersed, growing on the river bank and all, and yet I can't find a link anywhere about aquatic mosses in Florida rivers!
> 
> **edit**
> 
> I just stopped including the "florida rivers" part of my google search terms, and suddenly I'm finding lots of mosses that look like what I found! The closest one is "Fontinalis antipyretica," but that was from a Washington State website. But maybe what I've found is some kind of Fontinalis?


I would bet thats what it is, common to SE.US
How about sending me some:biggrin:


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

I just got a lot of hits for "fontinalis in florida". Didn't read through any of the links but I did see quite a few species in the descriptions that may be here. 

Church, I'm not convinced everything we have is on the list, the Ceratopteris richardii wasn't on there and I just found it yesterday. 

Just so everyone that is envious knows, a lot of what we have on the list and pictured in this thread is growing throughout the US, even in Canada. So, you can just be envious that we can go out and get it in the middle of January. :flick: 

Waterfaller1, Yes, some aquatic plants have submersed _and_ emergent forms, they're often species that stay near the shore line and are subjected to rising water levels. Their behavior in the wild with the seasons and changes can be much different than what they do in our tanks where parameters and conditions are nearly constant. If you find an interesting species on the shore and can ID it, you can search to find out if it is both aquatic and non aquatic. You'll probably want to start studying the emergent forms since it's sometimes almost impossible to differentiate two given species by their submerged forms, submerged plants are often shut off from the light and covered in slimy algae, mud etc. The emergent growth's flowers, or inflorescence, is the dead give away for differentiating some species, especially if they're in the same genus like Hydrocotyle. You just can't tell what H species it is until you see it flower, there are a lot of ludwigias that are the same way. Similar fully-aqautics can differ n the way they root or branch out, so make sure to pull the whole plant if you're not sure, rather than just grabbing a clipping, if you can.

Oh... make sure you know how to ID poison ivy before you go back out! Or maybe you're lucky like me and can stick it in your mouth with no issues (don't ask how I know that).:red_mouth


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

jaidexl said:


> I
> Oh... make sure you know how to ID poison ivy before you go back out! Or maybe you're lucky like me and can stick it in your mouth with no issues (don't ask how I know that).:red_mouth


OMG..I am the most alergic person on the face of this earth to poisonous species!:eek5: When I was a kid in NJ, I played in the woods and always had a bad case every year{never learned} Then, living in VA I was ms. weedeater for a day...thought I was going to hack down all the weeds around the house. HUGE mistake...it was the worst I have ever had. My eyes were sealed shut and I had to go on steroids to get some relief...evil stuff!
Thanks for the tips.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

While looking around for different stuff I found this...don't know if it might interest you.

Click Here

HERE TOO


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## KevinC (May 24, 2004)

Even in the great white north we can find some useful plants:

I got some very nice Vallisneria americana and ceratophyllum demersum out of Lake Winnebago back in August. Didn't need to wade - it was washed up along the shore (some was too dried to take though). 12" of ice now - have to wait until thaw to see if there is anything else interesting.


Kevin


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

waterfaller1 said:


> So are some of you saying that some plants can grow on land & under water? I have noticed something that looks like pennywort growing all around that lake. Please don't say 'yes'...you'll have me scrutinzing every plant & weed I see.:biggrin:


yep, they do. lots of aquarium plants grow emersed in nature (i dont think many stem plants do though, only 1 i have can hold its wait). i know crypts are like this. the madagascar lace plant needs to spend a certain amount of time out of the water each year i think (the dry season in nature).


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

That's really interesting. I wonder how long it took people to figure out what would look good in a planted tank, what wouldn't work, etc.


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

i dont think it took that long, i think all plants capable of growing both submersed and emerged grow along the water line and grow in both forms. like crypts, they grow in muddy areas as well as partially underwater, as well as submerged (in a slope form), i have heard of pennywort growing in every part of ponds and then coming up out of the water to the wet ground around it.

so people saw it growing underwater, thought it would look nice in their tank and put it in (much like you did)


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Yeah, I'm sure a lot of it wasn't too thought out or tested, just grab and go, with a sort of silent natural selection going on to result in the long list of common plants in the hobby. Probably the same with fish, only the strong survive, we try, we fail we forget. Or we succeed and pass it on to the next guy.


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

much of what is going on with reef aquariums now. people attempting to keep anemones, very specialized fish, cephalopods, and difficult corals like dendrophyta. most fail, those few that suceed add to the pool of knowledge and eventually we will know enough to significantly lower their mortality in captivity and maybe breed them. same is true for the celestial pearl danio (which i am hoping to get within the nest month, btw anyone know of a place to get them cheap pm me so as i dont steal the thread).


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

@[email protected] said:


> much of what is going on with reef aquariums now. people attempting to keep anemones, very specialized fish, cephalopods, and difficult corals like dendrophyta. most fail, those few that suceed add to the pool of knowledge and eventually we will know enough to significantly lower their mortality in captivity and maybe breed them. .


 Now you are stepping into an area that I have more experience. The reason many fail is they do not do their research. People are impatient, and some I hate to say..just do not care. You cannot put certain marine specimens in either the wrong or too immature of a system. Wrong lighting, tanks too new, too small, too crowded,don't keep check nor keep parameters where they should be, improper nutrition,neglect..etc.
I waited over two years to add certain inhabitants to my reef tank. I keep many that are thought of as either hard to keep or impossible. I have worked in a shop that specializes in sw only, and have seen many die at the hands of inexperienced hobbyists. Sure, stress plays a big role as well..but this can be reduced with proper handling and care.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

waterfaller1 said:


> Sure, stress plays a big role as well..but this can be reduced with proper handling and care.


And water changes :thumbsup: A lot of people don't realize the properties that are replenished by weekly WCs. My father in law relies on calcium additive to make up for his lack of WCs, yet his nitrates are through the roof, and the roof is on fire. it's been a few months now that I've been trying to drill into him that weekly WCs would cancel out the need for the calcium and will also take care of the nitrate issue if he quits using his nasty tap water (full of ammonia, nitrites and nitrates).


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

wow you guys could help me and my dad on the nano reef we are doing. we modified an eclipse six (put in a new aquaclear 70 filter instead of the eclipse one for a refugium with chaeto and 9 watts on it, added an ehiem ecco canister filter and put in carbon and biochem zorb instead of bioballs, stuffed 2 36 watt pc lamps in the hood) we bought 13 lb of live rock and a bit of sand. wow talk about biodiversity. we have 2 kinds of macro algae (one is probably cualerpa, theres a plant that can be found at your local beach), some mini corals (one is a tiny schlerophyta, not sure about spelling, one soft grey one), tons of feather dusters, some bristal worms (the small red and black ones that some say are beneficial), and even a brittle star. thats just hitchhikers.

are either of you two one nano-reef.com, i could use some identification help.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

I'm on NR sometimes, not so much since the older members started revolting against noobs, not sure how that's going these days. 

IME, you're not going to really need the ehiem on a 6gl nano. 10.2lb LR does the job in my 8gl, two water changes a month and top offs with RO/DI and nitrates are 0ppm. And you have a refuge of chaeto to boot. You're not going to be able to support much live stock in the given space anyway.

Ok, I'm done hijacking the rest is for another forum. :smile:


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

OK..forgive my photography skills. This was the best I could do before the paper I had them laying on got blown by the wind.. 
Here are two different kind of unknown critters I fished out of the snail farm this morning. The one on the left is like the 'BIG one' I cannot find.



















And here is a really crummy pic of one like the two small ones that is still in the tank hanging upside down from the surface of the water.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

My guess is caddisfly larvae


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## SearunSimpson (Jun 5, 2007)

I would say caddisfly too. Anyone who fly-fishes or has some entemology background will be able to probably help you. I flyfish alot, mostly for pacific salmon from the beaches, and for trout and what not in lakes and rivers, and I would have to agree on caddisfly larvae.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

I'd pop 'em open and feed them to my fish, apparently they're a big part of a wild fish diet.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

jaidexl said:


> My guess is caddisfly larvae


 The snail farm is located above the refugium for my 90 gal reef, so at night the light from below shines up behind the farm. Last night I was even with the tank, and noticed there are some of these guys still creeping around in there.:eek5: What will they do when they are ready to leave the water, or do they? The tank is looking pretty good for wild pond plants. I had to remove all the red ones, they just got soft and melted away. I will get a new pic of it today.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

They're the sister order to moths, so if you see any weird moth looking critters flying around, it's probably them. They have a pretty short life span as adults that consists of hunting down mates and nectar/sap, so unless you have a lot of that in your house then they probably won't last long. There are about 4 of the 7000 species that are considered extinct, very susceptible to variants in water quality and pollutants, so consider the quality of your tank water to be very good.

Yes, I was a biology/bug nerd in school


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

well i guess you forgot to do a dip before you put the plants in the tank.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

That's not necessarily the case. Most of them lay eggs on the surface or directly below it in a gelatinous casing, some dive to the bottom to lay them on the substrate. I could be wrong, but I don't think any of them attach eggs to plants. Perhaps it's entirely possible to pick them up from plants, but more likely they laid the eggs in the tank, especially considering she's in FL and we all have our windows open lately for the free AC.

Edit, I just remembered what thread we're in, so Marko might have a point there considering we're yanking these out of ditches etc. Either way, not a big deal, feed them to the high protein fish and watch them color up.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

jaidexl said:


> My guess is caddisfly larvae


Ok..now ...you failed to tell me how big these things get! :icon_eek: I thought I got them all out, but today I did a wc on the farm and found one at least as long as a match! Weird things...hope they fly better than they crawl..for their sake.:tongue:


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## @[email protected] (Oct 24, 2007)

lol thats funny, i never got any critters in my freshwater tanks other then snails.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

LOL, incidentally, I don't think they're very good at flying. :tongue: just short sporadic, crash and burn type flights, IIRC. Like a parrot out of it's cage.




Back to the plants:

Church, did you ever get ahold of that fontinalis looking moss? I'm itching to see what you've found there.


I've transfered a few of mine to the high tech display tank...

Here is some mermaid weed
before









1 week

















And below is the Ceratopteris richardii that I posted on page 3. Thomas R. Warne
at C-fern.org told me I will have to count spores under a microscope to be sure, says it could be C. richardii, C. thalictroides, or a cross of the two. Until I see some growth similar to plain old water sprite, I'll call it C. richardii, or just C-fern  ....

before (rising stems came out while emergent)









1 week (more risers, thinner, less branching, otherwise the same but taller)









Also added some Eleocharis geniculata, but it's not really doing anything yet, a few new shoots in the center and some root action so far....


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Cool..great shots! That mermaid weed is getting very nice in your tank. I have been meaning to try and get some shots of the plants I kept from the lake and see if you could ID them. I will work on it in the next few days. I think I have the flu coming on though...feeling pretty cruddy the last couple days.


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## pweifan (Nov 2, 2006)

jaidexl, I gathered some mermaid weed during one of Tom Barr's "Plant Fest" outings in the Gainesville area. I could never get it to look as healthy as yours, the stem would continue to grow but the bottom-most leaves would fall off. I'd always have only about a 4 inch section of leaves 

That triandra in the background looks awesome as well. By the way, I'm still interested in some, but I don't think weather-wise now is a great time here in OH.

I just found out today that we might be going to NC in the summer, I'd imagine some interesting plants could be found there. I'm looking forward to it. I really think it's fascinating to gather your own plants and watch them grow in a tank.


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Waterfaller, hope you get well soon, I just had the bug a couple times last month.

pweifan, I definitely got the ich for grabbing plants outside, more fun than propagating stems from someone else's tank, the emergent/submersed transition makes it even more interesting, IMO. I hope I can catch one of Tom's outings around here someday.

I do notice some stem base rot on the mermaid, but I'm hoping it's only because it's newly submersed, roots and spiky side shoots are sprouting from the base so that's a good sign. I have SMS and Eco under it, 192w (3wpg) 6700k over it for 6 hours, 96w for 3 hrs , and a lean EI dosing schedule of NPK and CSM+B. Once it gets tall enough and I can propagate some more stems, I'll try a cluster in the back corner and see how they fare.


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## Paleboy (Jun 8, 2007)

Holey heck! I just found this thread tonight and have been trying to get to the end so I could post. I grew up in Florida and always had an aquarium. However, I didn't really get into plants until I moved to California (didn't know anybody). So a couple of years ago, when I moved back to FL, I started checking out the local waterways after having read about The Tom's Plant Fest outings. At first it was just anacharis/elodea, hornwort, cobomba, bacopa and jungle val. But soon I started finding all kinds of cool stuff like several species of hairgrass, a bunch of different potomagetons, najas?, a few ludwigias including arcuata, some saggitaria, m. umbrosum, and a huge mound of m. micranthemoides growing in a lake right by my apartment! The biggest shocker was when a friend and I were scoping out an area of the econ river a year ago and found riccia floating by! I've seen the moss too but it just looks to me like whatever the common moss was that we used to get at aquarium shops in the old days- willow moss I think. Still very cool to see in its' natural environment. As far as usable fish (I'm not so good at catching those) I found florida flagfish and H. formosa (very cool). Here are a couple of pics that just happen to be on this computer. Waterfaller1, I'll catch up to you later and give you my list of where I've been and what I've found.


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## Paleboy (Jun 8, 2007)

Can't tell but the red leaved one turned out to be L. arcuata but looks more like repens in it's emergent form and the other one I can't remember if it was m. umbrosum or b. monieri. I didn't take any. That one is in like an inch of water. Now that I know other people are excited about this stuff I'm going to have to either find all my old photos or go out and take some more! It is truly a sight to behold seeing natural groupings of these common aquarium plants in huge proportions and in perfect health. Gives you the sense that ours are just pale imitations of what mother nature does best.


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Cool..hi Kurt. One of the plants I found looks like HM, but there is another similar shaped one, but with much thicker leaves. One is a grass like plant, that sends runners out to new plantlets like chain sword does. They all stay connected.
I won't be able to come up to your store tomorrow, maybe this afternoon or on sunday. Look forward to officially meeting you.:icon_cool


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## Church (Sep 14, 2004)

jaidexl said:


> Church, did you ever get ahold of that fontinalis looking moss? I'm itching to see what you've found there.


Not yet, but I'm glad you asked... I've been planning on going back to the hillsborough river state park one of these days, to do just that, but recently I was eating lunch at a local park called Lowry Park (some of you may know that name as a zoo, I will forever know it as the park that the zoo got its name from!), and I decide to get up and see what aquatic plants are growing in the stream right next to the picnic tables, and what do I see?... tons of that same moss! Along with even MORE tons of what is apparently ludwigia repens! It was all green, with no red coloration to it, but it looked in EVERY other way like red ludwigia. So yeah, I'm going back there instead, since it's closer than the state park.

I'll keep you guys posted. I figure in the next week or so I'll have the time to take a field trip or two!


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## Bingo414 (Feb 7, 2008)

I've lived in Gainesville, FL my entire life. I used to play down in the creeks every weekend when I was little. I wonder what kind of cool aquatic species I could find in the Hogtown Creeks system today... Hello all fellow Floridians, BTW!


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## jaidexl (Sep 18, 2006)

Hello Bingo! I'm sure you'll find at least a few sweet specimens, or more. Make sure to post some pics once you gather some!


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## waterfaller1 (Jul 5, 2006)

Hi Bingo, albeit a little late. OMG..remember those critters from the pond? The caddisfly larvae thingamajig? Well, today I tore down the snail farm, I was going to ship out the MTS and red ramshorns to two different people that wanted them. Those creatures had taken over! I thought I got them all out...oh no. They were in various stages...the substrate was literally alive!!:icon_eek: So all I found were empty shells everywhere. I wondered why it seemed like the pond snails weren't breeding like they were before the pond plants..that is why, those things were living off them. *shudders*


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