# Plants from the Santa Fe River in N. Florida



## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

While on Tom Barr's Plantfest 2, I collected a number of plants from a shallow region with flowing water, and I have them established in a 20 gallon aquarium. One is a narrow-leaved Sagittaria that has leaves that come up in a wide spiral, unlike any other Sagittaria I have seen. Another is a kind of Vallisneria, that, so far, seems to have no tendency to produce long leaves. In the shallow regions of the river these Vals had very short leaves, and I expected that in the still water of the aquarium, I would get the usual two or three feet long leaves. However, so far, the plants are retaining their dwarf appearance. More time is needed to see just how long the leaves it produces can be. The leaves are an olive brown in good light. Another is a huge Myriophyllum that has two inch long, light green leaves. Another is a brownish Najas which is quite different from my green variety of Najas. Finally, there is a Cyperus species growing totally submersed in the river. In the aquarium, it is the slowest growing of all my finds, but it looks healthy. It looks like Cyperus helferi, but I would need to grow it side by side with C. helferi to see which one was best suited for the aquarium.


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## tsunami (Jan 24, 2004)

Do you have any pictures, Paul? Some of those sound beautiful.

Carlos


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## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

I second Carlos's request! Living 20 minutes from the Santa Fe, I'd love to see what you got. 

I really need to dust out my canoe and take a trip!  Do you recall what part of the river you were in? Downstream from Rum Island?


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## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

Here is a picture of the dwarf Vallisneria in the river. I thought that its short lleaves were produced because it was in a shallow part with moving water, and that if it were in deeper regions or where the water was moving slowly, it would have long leaves. 









I expected it to grow two or three foot long leaves in the aquarium like the available aquarium variety or varieties of Vallisneria americana that we have. I was quite surprised to see that it remained short! See the picture, below, of a plant that has been in my aquarium for about 2 months, and which has already produced a runner with two new plants.

If I recall correctly, we did the section from U.S. 27 to state road 47. The shallow part where all the good plants were was fairly near the put-in. 
More pics to come! I can't avoid work any longer.


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## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

This picture shows the spiral Sagittaria, the large yellow-green Myriophyllum, and the Cyperus species (lower middle part of the picture). The spiral Sag. has a very wide spiral, not a tight corkscrew.


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## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

I finally figured out what the large yellow-green Myriophyllum is. The plant I fished out of the Santa Fe river was not rooted and was actually pink, but I could only get a yellowish color in the aquarium. Anyway, when some of it got above the surface and became emersed, it was instantly recognizable as parrot's feather, _Myriophyllum aquaticum_. Emersed, it has a very characteristic blue-green color.


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## Error (Apr 16, 2004)

Excellent. I wonder if M. aquaticum is native to FL, or escaped from a fish farm?

I have a plant from Pennsylvania that I suspect is M. aquaticum. It's green/yellow/brown in color, and it grows faster than anything else I have.


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## HeyPK (Jan 23, 2004)

Aqua 5-0 posted three pictures in the Album/Native Plants of an unknown plant from Hawaii that has to be _Myriophyllum aquaticum_:

By the way, the Vallisneria from the Santa Fe is starting to grow long leaves, up to two feet long, and so it is not a dwarf variety as I had originally thought.


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## Error (Apr 16, 2004)

That's a dead ringer for mine


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## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

Paul, 

Did you ever have any success growing or id'ing the Cyperus you found? Curious.


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## plantbrain (Jan 23, 2004)

Well Burt, we will find more shortly
The water was very low that year. I doubt the water will fall much by mid July. 

Ricky is completing the plan and site for the event.
We are hitting the Crypt infestation again also, I thought they would have killed it, but it's still there. 

The pic was at High Spring right as the rapids started down from the canoe launch and took a left. 

The thing I liked most about the spot was all the mossed covered stones.
Rum island is a good fish collecting spot. 

We are going to hit two new springs this year and a plant wholesaler also. 
Then the marine plant fest. 

I have a new Pentax 5 MP camera that's water proof to 6 feet and has a 4x zoom. I'll also bring an underwater light. It's perfect field type camera, small, rugged and can take underwater pictures. The SDony U60 is good but has no zoom, low resolution and is larger. This is about 75-100$ than the Sony.

It'll be a good one this year. TFH has a person coming to do an article on the event.

Yeehaw!

Ricky will have the DFW site up about it soon.
Paul, if you want anything, let me know. 

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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