# Bucephalandra



## mscotty12321 (Jan 31, 2015)

How many varieties of Bucephalandra does it look like I have here? I got all of these at the plant club meetings. The one with older blueish leaves with reddish new leaves is the only one I thought survived. Maybe it is just the access to light that caused the different appearances.

I am going to post this at DFW Fishbox too because I do not have much confidence in my pictures displaying in this post. Crownman will probably have the best answer since he grew them to begin with.


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## fishyjoe24 (May 18, 2010)

this may help.

https://buceplant.com/collections/bucephalandra


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## mscotty12321 (Jan 31, 2015)

So, here is what I am thinking. The ones marked "1" are probably the same variety. I think someone in the club said "Brownie Blue" one time. The ones marked "2" are probably the same as "1", but they seem to have wavier leaf margins. There were some brought to the club meetings one time that were referred to as "Wavy Leaf". The ones marked "3" seem to be the most different. The color lacks the blue cast and newer leaves do not have the red tint.

I even checked out the buceplant.com site and it is so hard to really tell the difference in the plants. It may be a mystery forever.


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## CrownMan (Sep 12, 2005)

Plant 1 was called Brownie Blue when Alex purchased them about 3 years ago but looks like Brownie Jade. Plant 3 looks like Green Wavy. think Alex bought 6 different varieties of buces back then and all of the names have changed multiple times since then. Some of them survived and quite a few perished. I am certainly not a buce expert but I have had luck growing them out. I will continue to grow them and when I have too many, I will distribute them club members. They were all originally purchased with money from the club treasury and I'm not sure Alex has the contact info for the seller. If he does, I will contact the seller and see if he can identify them.

I will try to bring a few samples of the different types of buces I have to the next meeting. Hopefully, someone in the club is better at buce identifications. I am currently growing out a version I believe to be Lamandau Mini but it is an extremely slow grower. I think it would do well in nano tanks.

One thing I have noticed about all of the versions of Buces I have growing is while CO2 is not required, it is recommended for healthy thick growth but the key is not to have too much light on them. In my high light tanks, I have fast growing stems that shade the buces and they grow more compact and flower frequently. I also have to keep a good water flow going in their tanks or just like anubias and other slow growing rhizome plants, they will develop cladaphora and black beard algae.


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## mscotty12321 (Jan 31, 2015)

Thanks for the info Crownman. Bucephlandra is certainly a difficult plant to identify and it does not help that a lot of the photos online seem to be color enhanced.


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## MacFan (Jul 30, 2006)

I really like them. I have some from the club, and a bunch from buceplant.com which I've bought a lot of plants from. Once they grow out more, I'll bring some to the meetings.


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## mscotty12321 (Jan 31, 2015)

Crownman, any idea what this one is? It is one that you brought to the meeting on Saturday. It looks like a different variety from those you brought before. I like the dark purple leaves. I am sure it will look different after it starts growing in my tank.


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## CrownMan (Sep 12, 2005)

Not Sure. I bought Both Mini and regular Catherinae and Lamandau Blue about the same time in 2015/2016 from an ebay vender. It was sold as one of those 3. However, the names have probably changed since then. Check out the Catherinaes on Buceplant.com to see if it matches one of those. There is one Catherinae that has a purple coloration and similar leaf structure.


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