Question about these two plants.

[gfink]

Guys, I have a few questions about these two plants I found. In addition, has anyone had good luck with this vendor?

1) Dwarf Subulata(Sagittaria subulata)
http://www.ah-supply.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=6599

Listed as low light here, but plantgeek says otherwise. What do you guys think?

Any luck carpeting with this plant?

2) Red Tiger Lotus (Nymphaea zenkeri)
http://www.ah-supply.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=6601

How big of a plant is this? Would my 29 gal be too small?

Also listed as low light here, but plantgeek says otherwise. What do you guys think?

 

[Tiffi]

I had both plants before in a low light tank with DIY CO2 in Germany. They did very well, the subulata even formed a dense carped.

www.tropica.com says for the subulata, that it is low light, but the lotus is supposed to be medium light. As I said, I had both and they did well. It just depends, that they might get bigger/longer with low light and not stay as short as in a high light aquarium.

I know people from this forum bought light kits from ahsupply and were very satisfied. I don't know about the plants. I've bought mine from www.aquariumplants.com
They have an outstanding customer service, really quality plants and the prices are the same as ahsupply.

 

[Purrbox]

I have Dwarf Sag in a medium to low light aquarium and it is doing well. It is spreading slowly and in another month or two I expect to have a very nice carpet. It's a fairly inexpensive plant, so I would consider it worth the try even if your tank is strictly low light.

I have no experience with the lotus or the vendor. I thought for a moment that I knew the vendor, but the one I had purchased a light kit from was www.ahsupply.com.

I would second Tiffi's recommendation for www.aquariumplants.com. I've purchased from them with excellant results and plan to use them the next time I order plants.

 

[TankGirl]

I have both of these plants and the dwarf sag is what I would call medium light - I have it in 2wpg and it is growing great - have not tried it in low but you might have trouble with it reaching in low light, and growing much longer to get to the light.

The lotus is a lily that is a marvelous plant that I have in a 10 gal where it is staying relatively small, and in my 55 where it has grown almost to the top of the tank. You can manage it by snipping off large leaves and snipping the lily pad that will shade your tank. I originally purchased this plant as a part of a low-light package, and it does fine like that.

I do not have any experience with this vendor, which is very easily confused with AHSupply.com, a very reputable aquarium lighting supplier with a stellar reputation.

 

[jcarlilesiu]

I have dwarf sag in my 10 gal with 1.5 w/gal and its great... not really spreading, but staying nice and green and growing upward. i have no CO2 and i just fertilize twice a week

 

[malkore]

dwarf sag wants at least 1.5wpg to grow. 2wpg should make it grow quickly and carpet. takes some maintenance to remove excess growth so it won't choke itself out.

for red lotus, the stronger your lighting, the less likely it'll put out surface leaves...which, while huge and neat looking, totally block light from reaching the bottom of the tank. if it puts many of these out, prune them from the base, and it will eventually quit putting so many out (yes you can actually 'train' plants to grow certain ways...to a degree)

 

[Zezmo]

I have grown those Lotus, I still have one. In a higher light situation that is in my tank, the larger of my lotus grew like crazy. I would see a leaf sprout in the morning. By dinner time it was an inch from the surface, by the time the lights went off they would have broke the surface. This was every day. Needless to say this plant took constant trimming. When I pulled it from my tank, and sold it at auction, it had a huge root system. My other Lotus I tried to plant in an area that would limit it's rood growth some, and I trim it very aggressively. It still puts several leaves to the surface a week. The plus side is my Gouramis love the pads for bubble nesting.

The lily has 2 types of leaves, thinner/softer submersed leaves. These will still go to the surface, but when they get there they begin dieing quickly. The second kind of leaves are thicker and more "rubbery" These are the leaves that are supposed to float on the surface. If not trimmed very regularly they will readily choke off the top of your tank. Of course, this is all with over 4wpg, CO2, etc.

 

[Tiffi]

I'm sorry malkore, but I have to disagree with your opinion that dwarf sag need at least 1.5wpg to grow.

I had a tank in Germany with only 1.08wpg and had a nice carpet of the dwarf sag. It took about 4-5 month and I had to take out a bunch of them regularly, since it was growing over everything else. I didn't use any special fertilizer other than laterite in the bottom, did not vacuum, had the detrius as fertilizer and some DIY CO2. Plus the sag was not really getting very high neither, maximum about 4.5".

 

[TankGirl]

In my case, regarding the dwarf sag, it grows as a pretty low carpet in the open areas, and where it has sent runners into more shady areas the leaves are drastically longer, about double the length compared to the plants getting full light. That makes me assume it needs brighter light to grow in a compact form, but perhaps in the shady areas the available light is even lower than I suspect.