water lotus

870 Views 5 Replies 5 Participants Last post by majstor76, Oct 21, 2010

the_deeb

Discussion Starter · Oct 20, 2010

I'd like to find a lotus/lilly-like plant for my paludarium. I'm thinking of one of the Nyphaea sp. I know most people want to keep them in their submerged form but I'm actually hoping for the emersed/floating leaves. I've heard that they require very high light, but is this the case if you're hoping for submerged growth or does it also apply if you're looking for floating leaves?

Is there a particular species that stays fairly small? FWIW, the tank is fairly large (water portion is around 5'L X 2'W X 14" T), but I still don't want it to be completely overwhelmed. If you can think of better plant suggestions than Nyphaea sp. I'd be glad to hear them.

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Noahma

· #2 · Oct 20, 2010

I have three species in my tank, Nymphaea pubescens, Nymphaea lotus 'Zenkeri' and an unknown species. All are doing great under low med. light. I have had floating lilly's in the tank, but I discourage my plants from doing that now, because that is ALL they wanted to do after the first one lol.

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majstor76

· #3 · Oct 20, 2010

I have some water lily and had a 4-5 flowers at one time in outside bathtub on full sun. Now is indoor, just a fraction of rhizome and already have a few submerged leaves in aquarium without artifical light, only sun from southern window. So, lily doesnt need hig temp/sun to grow. I have also some lotus and since its tropical plant now is in state of hibernation. I dont know how would behave in heated aquarium.
Water lily first have submerged leaves and occaisonaly relases floating leaf just to check where is the surface. If the leaf hits the surface, plant stops producing submerged leaves and goes all out for floating leaves.
There are dwarf lily varieties, for example

http://water-garden-blog.com/dwarf-and-small-water-lilies/

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