Tiger Lotus pruning

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Billsgate

Aquarium Advice Addict
Joined
Apr 29, 2004
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1,995
Location
Belgium
I just added a Tiger lotus to my tank a couple of days ago. Can someone please explain how I best keep it pruned? The guy at the lfs told me something about it, but I didn't completely understood his explanation.
It's growing quite well, 2 new leaves have 'unfolded' in 5 days time, and 2 more are on their way.

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Generally I pick a height around 6" and clip any runners that try to go above that.

It keeps the plant from trying to put all of it's leaves on the surface. Mainly because once they get a leaf on the surface, every leaf after that try's to reach the surface. It's basically training for your plant. "Bad plant! Stay down!"

The main reason to keep them trained is that if they get a lot of surface leaves going, they'll block all the light to your other plants.
 
I trained my tiger lotus for about a month. Since then I never had to prune a leaf again that tryed to get to the top and I got 5 plants out of the original one already (after 3-4months).
 
They just divide after a while with good care. If you pull them out (what I did a few days ago) to for example relocate them you'll see the individual big roots. I've also had one before in a different tank that reproduced by dividing into more of those brown "balls".
 
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