# What's your Favorite Cryptocoryne?



## Cvurb

Hey guys, what is your favorite Crypt plant? And why? I'm interested in what you guys like  

Ill start off... I love my C. Petchii, even though it is really young. The leaves are really cool, and it is growing pretty fast for a crypt. But I hope this changes as my other Crypts start to grow lol


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## ferchu22

Uhmmmm, what a difficult question, I really like all the crypts!!

Some of my favorites (that I already have) are Wendtii 'Tropica', Usteriana, Minima, etc, but maybe 'Tropica' could be my favorite, because it has nice leaves bullated pattern and color, and it's really easy to propagate, as most wendtiis.

Regards


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## illustrator

To me the small differences between different species and varieties are very interesting, so most interesting is a mixed collection.

Some grow poorly in my (submersed) setup, and I like these less. It is not fun to see a plant getting smaller and smaller untill eventually there is only a piece of rhizome left. Even while I know what water parameters my setup has and I compare these with internet info, it stays a trial-and-error. So when I find one that does really well, I instantly like it.

I am concerned that "wild collected plants" are not always "sustainably collected". Sure, crypto's can grow in very large stands and dominate streams, but from sellers it is not normally possible to get info on which ones are overcollected and of which only a small part of a population is taken, which is harmless. The plants which I have now are mainly from the general trade, so plants that are propagated in huge numbers by specialized nurseries. I like these because they are certainly not from overexploited populations, so I don't have a bad concience when I buy them. But I would love to have plants which are decendants of those collected by specialists, taken from nature in very small numbers and with collection data. To me such plants can have an added value because they can be a "reserve" for in case a wild population goes extinct (= is exterminated because of landuse changes). Still better to maintain some plants in collections than to let them go extinct entirely.

But I also love the search, "the hunt", for something special. When I have to search for a particular plant for a long time and then finally find it, this makes me very happy. There is a particular species which is very special for me: _C. affinis_. When I was a small boy, this was the "common crypt" and when my father started a small aquarium for the family, this plant did exceptionally well. For years it was the only plant in our tiny family aquarium. In early teenage years I set up a larger aquarium, but _C. affinis_ quickly melted after replanting and I threw the rhizomes away - very disappointed (then nitrate poisoning cost me all my fish). That was the last I saw of _C. affinis_ for many, many years.

I kept having aquariums, learned about water quality and "crypt melt", kept and bred a variety of fish, grew all kinds of plants and searched. OK; at first I serached a little bit, "just keeping my eyes open". Then I searched more, grew more and more crypts, threw any plant out of my aquariums that wasn't a crypt ... But it took a lot of time before I got the point that this plant would not likely appear in general trade because of it's susceptability to melt. Then I started to search in those "obscure" shops, owned by crazy hobbyists. Those shady corners where treasures can be found - occasionally and only when you take time to inspect each tank carefully. And then, only this year (after maybe 25 years of keeping my eyes open) I found it again. And not just that: in 2 different shops I found C. _affinis_. I bought them in both, and planted all together, thinking that I might have a nice clump soon. They do very well, but now that they grow well and develop larger, more healthy leaves, the plants from both shops also start to differ from each other. Temporarily? I don't know, but I start to suspect that I stumbled on two different clones of _C. affinis_. I will soon move one to a different aquarium so that they will not grow as a mixed clump in the long term.

First the long search, then the finding with the feeling that I got something rare and precious, and now the mystery of maybe having 2 different clones, combined with a lot of sentimental feelings for this particular crypt: yes, _C. affinis_ is certainly my favorite crypt!


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## Khamul1of9

So far I have only had two species bloom for me, and of the two I find the flower of C. cordata to be the prettiest.


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## 954baby

I like C. albida alot and C. tropica grows like a mad man. C. elliptica is really cool, working on propagating a colony right now.


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## Cvurb

Nice! I can't wait for my C. Wendtii 'Tropica' to start to really grow submerged. C. Blassii is also really cool looking with the wine red color underneath and the dark pattern on top. I made a mistake and had it all melt on me :/ but it's coming back now, shooting up a leave. I think a lot of Crypts can't really be loved until they are fully grown.


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## FarCanal

Mine is the one in my Avatar, Cryptocoryne cordata 'Rosanervig'. It's only flowered the once and I think is the best looking spathe I've had so far. I'm aching for it to flower again ....


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## Scotty

Mine would have to be 'green gecko'. I love the neon green colors of the leaf with the red vein that runs down to the stem...


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## Cvurb

Oh, nice plants, I definitely want and will need the Rosanervig someday. Hopefully sooner than later. And the green gecko will be sick when I find it.

If you guys ever find a new Crypt in you LFS that you don't have will you pass it by, or always buy it?


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## Scotty

Cvurb said:


> If you guys ever find a new Crypt in you LFS that you don't have will you pass it by, or always buy it?


I always buy and try.... LOL


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## FarCanal

Cvurb said:


> If you guys ever find a new Crypt in you LFS that you don't have will you pass it by, or always buy it?


Here in Australia I have every crypt that can be bought easily. We don't have many that are in circulation in the shops. I also live in a small country town where the LFS don't sell named crypts, just "Crypt in Pot" and even that is rare. All crypts are bought online or when I'm visiting a city. If I see anything I don't have come up I buy it immediately if I can. I've heard rumors that there are some around that I don't have, but I've given up asking or putting out the feelers. Hopefully one day I'll get a Affinis or Usteriana or Hudoroi or Zukalii ... I could go on and on.

I'm sure Supasi will have a similar story to tell if he reads this.


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## ddavila06

i love my usteriana because is the only crypt i have flowered, underwater. i also like its bullated leaf pattern and red underneath. it is a huge crypt and makes an exelent center piece if you have a large enough tank.


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## illustrator

Cvurb said:


> If you guys ever find a new Crypt in you LFS that you don't have will you pass it by, or always buy it?


Depends. If it is wild collected I will pass it by because I don't waht to support large scale uncontrolled commerceal collecting. More likely it will be something in-vitro propagated by some less known nursery, and more likely than not mislabelled. I am aware of some of those which show up in the LFS' from time to time.

For now I concentrated on buying plants from which the label is very likely correct (mainly from 2 nurseries which actually do pay attention to such things). I am reluctant to experiment with obscure/wrongly labelled ones because my space is limited. I would like to try to grow the same varieties for a longer timespan, rather than switching from one to the next indefinately. Any plant that is doing well will ultimately limit my possibilities to start growing another variety. I feel that a correctly identified crypt is more valuable than one which I might never be able to identify.

I have some 20 varieties now and try to combine growing a varied collection of Crypts with a landscaped aquarium and breeding livebearing fish, therefore I have less space compared to someone who grows crypts in small pots. Plants which I am likely to replace are those which do not grow well in my aquaria, which implies that i have about 2 potential places for low-growing crypts right now and several more in some weeks from now (once I re-start my second aquarium with a new decoration - in fact, i'll replace the whole tank with a new one).

So what i do is I make a carefull planning and with a list of preferences in my mind I try to obtain those plants when they show up in trade. For this I cross-check stocklists from nurseries with stated requirements and descriptions. Since I know more or less which nurseries sell to the LFS', these selected plants will likely show up sooner or later


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## Cvurb

Thats so cool. I love coming back to this thread everyday! 
FarCanal, that must be unbearable! But at least you have every one you can get. Are most Crypts illegal there?

What is the Rarest Crypt you guys have? I don't really have any rarer ones yet, but someday I hope I'll get the opportunity some, but not yet. I gotta talk to my LFS to get some new ones in, or do a trade with some of you guys lol


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## illustrator

None of mine is really rare but i am pretty sure that if I manage to keep growing the same ones I have now for 20 years, some will have become rare by then. Some of the ones that were common in trade some decades ago are now very rare. And this "coming and going like fashion" will only speed up, I'm afraid.


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## THHNguyen

Agreed I heard that x pupurea used to be pretty common decades ago and it's practically unseen these days. It took me a while to track one down...


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## FarCanal

Cvurb said:


> FarCanal, that must be unbearable! But at least you have every one you can get. Are most Crypts illegal there?


Unbearable ... it's hard coming on here and seeing all the beautiful crypts I can't get, so yes I guess so. We have very strict quarantine laws, you can't just import any plants, there is a massive amount of work that needs to be done with the law to get them on the allowable import list. That is just the first step of many that needs to be taken.



Cvurb said:


> What is the Rarest Crypt you guys have?


I don't know about rare in the wild, I have one crypt that I've never seen for sale before here and that is a Nurii. So for in Australia, it's a rare one.


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## Cvurb

Nice, I still need to get more variety for my collection, then go full on emersed like you did. Your amazing at it


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## HeyPK

Note: This thread was pretty thoroughly hijacked into a discussion of C. affinis, and so I moved the C. affinis discussion to its own thread.


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## Lxx

Hi! I like all crypts in my collection. Very nice for me is albida and hudoroi. But my favorite is always the next one that I can get. 
My rarest crypt, I think, is pygmaea. 
And I always buy every new crypt I see


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## Cvurb

Haha sweet. Albida definitely has one of the most beautiful spathes, and one of the best looking plants around. 
C. Pygmaea is really cool, do you know if you can grow it submersed? lol
Very cool. A crypt keeper from Russia  Would love to see your collections!


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## catfishbi

Cryptocoryne cordata 'Rosanervig


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## Cvurb

Ok, so my LFS plant guy is going to start getting in a lot of different crypts. I kinda talked him into it, and I can't wait to see what he gets. If he gets a lot of cool stuff, then I will have no choice but to take out my big driftwood pieces in my tank lol 
I cant wait!


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## illustrator

But ultimately space is limiting, I suppose ... If you guys get a really cool new crypt, how do you determine which one of the others has to go? In other words: what's your least favorite crypt and why?


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## HeyPK

Your less favorite crypts don't really have to go. Just put them in a soda pop bottle with some soil and a little water up on a window sill, and they will last for many years with only very little care.

This C. cordata culture is 7 years old. I have some that are over 10 years old.


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## THHNguyen

HeyPK said:


> Your less favorite crypts don't really have to go. Just put them in a soda pop bottle with some soil and a little water up on a window sill, and they will last for many years with only very little care.
> 
> This C. cordata culture is 7 years old. I have some that are over 10 years old.


Wow that is brilliant! I need to try that sometime.


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## ddavila06

HeyPK said:


> Your less favorite crypts don't really have to go. Just put them in a soda pop bottle with some soil and a little water up on a window sill, and they will last for many years with only very little care.
> 
> This C. cordata culture is 7 years old. I have some that are over 10 years old.


wow! is the cap open or is it completely closed? did you tape the bottle were you cut it in half??


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## HeyPK

I cut the top of the bottle off about where it gets as wide as it is going to get, plant the crypt and then tape the top back on with the cap screwed on. I keep about 1/4 inch of water over the soil. Every month or two I put in a flake of oatmeal or a few grass clippings to provide CO2. The grass clippings or any dried green leaves provide fertilizer as well. If the crypts start to die back, it is probably due to over fertilizing. Change the water if this seems to be happening. You don't get multiplication or a whole lot of growth with this set-up, but you can keep them alive practically forever. After several years algae may accumulate on the sides enough to cut out a lot of the light. I take a well-rinsed scrubbing pad---those dark green ones----remove the top, wipe off the algae down to the soil level, and tape the top back on. The algae comes back so slowly that I don't have to do this again for at least another year. The only way I have lost plants with this method is when I failed to check for three or four months and they dried up.

This picture is of some C. beckettii that has been in the soda pop bottle since 2004. Last fall I cleaned the algae off the inside, and now, a year later, not very much has grown back. This culture looks like it could use a little fertilizing with some green leaves.


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## m3177o

lol, What a great question. but also a bad one. crypts and anubias are like my babies. and you cant ask people who's their favorite child. you just love them all. but to answer your question, mine would be c. wendtii brown and c. parva and c. tropica


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## davemonkey

My favorite is _C. x willisii_ 'lucens' (or whatever the correct name is). It's the perfect size for most any aquarium (background in a pico and great foreground in larger tanks).


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## Cvurb

Oh yeah! I love yours in your 50G I think. Wasn't yours like bronze?


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## WeedCali

I think my favorite Crypt would have to be C. Keei... or Balansae, or Retrospiralis... theres too many Crypt to have a favorite!


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## BobAlston

davemonkey said:


> My favorite is _C. x willisii_ 'lucens' (or whatever the correct name is). It's the perfect size for most any aquarium (background in a pico and great foreground in larger tanks).


You likely already know that your C. x willisii will be illegal to possess in Texas at the end of the current month.

See here for more info.

http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/huntwild/wild/species/exotic/aquatic_plants/

and C. Keei mentioned above would also be illegal.

Bob


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## illustrator

It would be interesting to see how they got to this list. I mean: which species are reviewed and why these (and not others)? I notice that wendtii will be (or is) prohibited. I can understand that because it is actually growing as alien species in many places in the world (I am not familiar enough with the Texas climate to know it it would potentially manage there). But at least for the aquarium species a whole number is listed as "will be allowed" which is equally easy to grow in aquariums and probably has the same capability to survive outdoors as wendtii ...


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## rs79

C. sulphura? That name was changed ages ago. This list is seriously broken.


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## fishfan

Walkeri 'lutea'. Love this hardy plant; grows practically every place I put it with the ruffled leaf edges and maintains a pretty light green in my tanks.


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