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My emersed project

Brian Murphy

Brian Murphy

Member
Joined
20 Oct 2012
Messages
593
Location
Omagh, N.Ireland
I've been waiting a few months to buy a new optiwhite tank since breaking down my 36" tank full of kribs, but since I've been started paying off my future wedding each month, the extra cash isn't easy to get hold off. So I've decided to set up my 36" to grow emersed plants and see what happens, and while doing this I decided to set up a small 18" clearseal tank I also had lying around.
I've set up the the 18" first without a heat matt and I am monitoring the temperature which after 3 hours with light on is sitting at 21c. I've used water from my main fish tank.

Plants ordered so far are

Tropica Alternanthera reineckii 'Mini' and Tropica Staurogyne repens both are 1-2-GROW! (Aquaessentials)

Ludwigia Arcuata (in vitro) and Utricularia Graminifolia (in vitro) (Ebay Seller Underwatergarden)


36" x 12" Tank
Lighting - Allponds 39w luminare
Substrate - ADA Amazonia
35" x 11" Heat Matt (ordered)

18" x 10" Tank
Lighting - 15w Arcadia controller
Substrate - ADA Amazonia

Here are a few pics of the initial set up before adding water, heat mats or plants. Will add more later.

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I now have my first plants in a couple of days now, still have to get some wood and rocks into it as I'm gonna try some moss or riccia mixed with the yogurt aswell. Just wanted to get started so planted them with little thought to a final scape and maybe flooding at some point. Will wait until I have everything before doing my scape and moving things about.

So the plant list is as follows ....

Front Left - Staurogyne Repens
Middle Left & Front Right - Alternanthera reineckii 'mini'
Centre - Utricularia graminifolia
Back Left & Back Right - Ludwigia Arcuata
Back Centre - Rotala Indica (doing badly in my 5ft, so moved it here to see how it faired)

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Very interesting. Are they tropica 1 - 2 grow if so how many pots of Alternanthera reineckii did you use
 
Looking interesting! I will definetely keep an eye on this one.
I would drain the water down to the substrate surface, as the plants in the foreground, which are in the water, will start melting...
 
sa80mark said:
Very interesting. Are they tropica 1 - 2 grow if so how many pots of Alternanthera reineckii did you use
Click to expand...

The Staurogyne and Alternanthera are Tropica 1-2 grow and the Utricularia graminifolia and Ludwigia Arcuata are similar (in vitro) from a Ebay seller but look the biz! You get loads of plantlets from 1 pot so thats all I ordered, it says on the tub 6-8 small sections but I got probably double that 🙂

Antoni said:
Looking interesting! I will definetely keep an eye on this one.
I would drain the water down to the substrate surface, as the plants in the foreground, which are in the water, will start melting...
Click to expand...

I was wondering about doing that as it will mean the water level at the back going down and maybe drying out quicker and the plants at the back suffering. The substrate is on its natural slope that is recommended.
 
Yes, exactly like I said ... just above ambient room temp.
You can give lots of light for 12 hours a day or more if you get the humidity nice & high.

I grow mine outside or in the conservatory with natural light & that is obviously very bright compared to artificial light & we have 17 hours of sunlight at the moment....
 
foxfish said:
Yes, exactly like I said ... just above ambient room temp.
You can give lots of light for 12 hours a day or more if you get the humidity nice & high.

I grow mine outside or in the conservatory with natural light & that is obviously very bright compared to artificial light & we have 17 hours of sunlight at the moment....
Click to expand...

I had my smaller tank outside and it reached 45c lol
 
Hi all,
One of the problems with tissue cultured plants is the weaning period, but that looks like "fertiliser burn", this happens where there are a lot of salts are in solution in a small volume of water.

I think the problem is probably the ADA Amazonia, all the salts (fertiliser) it contained are now in solution in a very small volume of water. Plants will have different tolerances to high salt levels, but even resistant plants with very soft tissue (like "in vitro" plants) will burn as water is removed from the cells via osmosis. Utricularia graminifolia definitely comes from low conductivity/low fertility habitats, and Ludwigia arcuata may as well.

Ammonium NH4+ is a common cause of leaf burn, but K+ ions etc can also have this effect.

If you have a conductivity meter you could see what the conductivity of the water is, my suspicion would be that it will be on the milliSiemens scale (several thousand microS).

cheers Darrel
 
Damn! I was thinking it might be to do with the ADA Substrate ..... nowt I can do then apart from stopping the ei mix misting. Any ideas as to what might do well in this high nutrient type environment? Staurogynes seem ok and the Alternanthera seem ok but havent seen any big growth or anything, just gonna keep any eye on them. Afraid to move them into my main tank as the kribs will munch them. Time to clear the main tank out soon anyway. Got loads of landscape rocks today for scaping 🙂
 
I'm 2 weeks into my first dry start with HC Cuba and hair grass, things seem fine and no adverse affects with Amazonia (so far).
I have read a few times not to use EI water due to burning tho.
What temp do u have inside tank?
 
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