# Lobelia Cardinalis



## juleslorand (Dec 26, 2005)

I do not know why, but every time that I try to kep Lobelia Cardinalis in my Tank, they melt the next day. I have a 55 Gal tank with CO2 injection, HQI Lamp 150 W , 10,000 Kelvin, EI Dosing fertilizers, a big fish population and high temperature for the Discus (29 degree Celsius). The other plants are doing fine an pearling like crazy. It seems that the plants that I have bought from deferents sources have been grown emersed and are unable to adapt themselves to the immersed culture. Do I something wrong or is it a magic trick to grow this plant in an aquarium???
Thank you for your help.


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

I dunno. I've had perfectly well established Lobelia melt in my tank in a matter of days. I suspect it was related to a time when I let the nitrates bottom out. The other likely possibility is that it isn't tollerating the high temperatures very well. The vast majority of plants prefer temps in the 21-24 degree C range.


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## Aquaspot (Jan 19, 2006)

Most Lobelia species you find are grown emersed. However, they adapt to submersed growth quite readily. 
When you mention a melt, is it the whole plant (including stem, roots etc) or just the leaves? To have just the leaves melting is a normal process that the emersed plants will go through.


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

When I had a Lobelia melt every last molecule of the plant turned into goo and died in a matter of days. Even the roots turned to mush..........


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## freydo (Jan 7, 2006)

i don't think it's temperature, because mine are doing fine when the temp gets up to 30C. the plant does produce large roots... maybe you don't have enough substrate to support it?


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## juleslorand (Dec 26, 2005)

Aquaspot said:


> Most Lobelia species you find are grown emersed. However, they adapt to submersed growth quite readily.
> When you mention a melt, is it the whole plant (including stem, roots etc) or just the leaves? To have just the leaves melting is a normal process that the emersed plants will go through.


Yes, the whole plants including the roots are melting. My nitrates are high (50) ppm nd the phosphates 2 ppm. I have also tried to adapt the plant from emersed to submersed slowly ( in an little tank and raising the water level slowly until the plant is completeley immersed, but the next day under the water, they melted.
Jules


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## mrbelvedere138 (Jan 18, 2006)

A single halide over a 55? How do you get light to the edges of the tank?


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## dennis (Mar 1, 2004)

Lobelia does not seem to like change, imo. Allowing the plant to become shaded, or allowing nutrient levels to deplete or climb signifigantly seem to trigger a melt. I have often lost the top half of the plant but fixing the issue allowed the bottom portion to branch and reproduce itself before to long. Try to stabalize your water parameters and make sure the plants are not being shaded. Check your CO2 levels.


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## Bert H (Mar 2, 2004)

I have kept Lobelia for years without any issues. (Knocks on wood...) FWIW, my tanks hit the mid 80's in the summertime. I've never noticed any change in growth rates between winter and summer.


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## John N. (Dec 11, 2005)

I have some Lobelia dwarf form at 78 degrees, and at first most of the plant leaves and roots deteriorated in the first week or two. Despite the ugly and disheartening mess, I left them as they were and I noticed that new leaves bushes out to replace the dying parts. So it seems LC doesn't like change, and needs a transition period, either from emersed to submersed, and/or from tank to tank.

-John N.


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## dstephens (Nov 30, 2005)

John, that's interesting. I received my lobelia dwarf from you and it did the exact same thing. I actually started it in a small 10 gallon, and moved it to the 90 in a few days and that did not bode well. It looked so bad I wanted to toss it. I got busy, traveled for a week of work, came home and it was making a slow comeback. It has been 7-8 weeks and it looks fantastic now.


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## Aquaspot (Jan 19, 2006)

From our observations, this plant will go through a melt when initially planted. But that's usually the leaves and it's normal for it to drop every leaf it has and change to submersed ones.
Patience is required as it is a rather slow growing plant.


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## John N. (Dec 11, 2005)

Darrell I'm glad the Lobelia is bouncing back for you like it did me. 

I agree with Aquaspot, but in my case The Lobelia once establish is taking off, and branching out with leaves all the time. But it took about a month to get settled. So patience is key. 

-John N.


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## juleslorand (Dec 26, 2005)

mrbelvedere138 said:


> A single halide over a 55? How do you get light to the edges of the tank?


The light in hanging 13 inches above the tank (open tank) and the light reach the corner as well;
Jules


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## helgymatt (Sep 12, 2007)

I had a fabulous stand of lobelia before I left for a conference 5 days ago. :mad2:I came hope, the plants were totally melted. Apparently I forgot to turn my filters back on before I left. I have a DIY inline reactor which is powered by the filter. I'm not sure how those things run when the water is off, but my drop checker in my tank was completely yellow when I got home. I wouldn't think the CO2 would get higher when the reactor is not powered....any ideas on this one? So my thoughts are that either 1) they melted from too much CO2, 2) the nutrients got too high, or 3) the nutrients bottomed out, 4) other related problems when the bacteria die and the filter pumps out nasty stuff. 
I'm going to leave the remnants of the stems there and see if they make a recovering. 

Oh yeah and my Milwaukee solenoid stuck open all week on another tank. It seems everything goes wrong when I leave for a few days. Milwaukee is great and is sending me a new solenoid for no charge a week after they sent me a new needle valve. I'm glad Milwaukee has great customer service, but not glad all the parts are failing. I think it is partly my fault because I filled the bubble counter with macro solution for a few weeks!


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## Tex Gal (Nov 1, 2007)

I've had trouble with this plant as well. I tried it 2 times. I would get beautiful plants and then they would melt mid stem, with the tops floating off and growing roots. I'd have these tiny weenie tops. I'd try to plant those but could never get them to take off and grow. Since it's a pretty plant but there are others I like as well, I just didn't try it again. At least I know now I'm not alone!


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## helgymatt (Sep 12, 2007)

I had absolutely no problem growing this before. I had very lush growth and the plant would make dozens of sidestems in no time. Once I get things back in order I expect it to rebound once again.


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## wrkucera (Jan 6, 2008)

Same with everyone else, I think. when I first purchased lobelia cardinalis, I planted it in 55 gallon, 120 lbs. flourite red , not rinsed, and way too much light from what I've been told. Anyway, my LC never melted on me. not even from the beginning. It took several long weeks for the roots to really establish, and when they did, they still to this day don't develop a huge root system for me. What I mean is, ceratopteris thalictroides, in my tank, will created such a massive root system that I'll have a large crater left. My LC will create a good root system, however is easily uprooted without alot of substrate disturbance. A single plant would have continued to the top of my 55 gallon tank(it was at 10 inches tall. I have a small group of LC growing in the foreground and they aren't even the original plants. So my experience with Lobelia cardinalis is much different than others.


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## gnome (Jan 27, 2004)

Myself, as well as another guy, had dwarf lobelia turn to goo - starting at the tip, and quickly continuing down to the roots. The leaves would get "glassy" or "glazed" and then basically liquefy. I thought that maybe it was some sort of horrid plant disease, but when I was writing to this other guy who said the same thing happened to him, he said that he was sure it had to do with too much potassium vs. other macro-nutrients. And when I remembered back to this incident, sure enough, I had just started adding potassium sulfate *without* adding any nitrate or phosphate. 

I've never had it happen again, but it's not like I've been that much better about keeping my nutrients balanced. Other than that one unfortunate incident, I've found that it's almost impossible to kill this stuff. I now add stump remover (KNO3) and potassium phosphate (KH2PO4) "regularly" but only add SeaChem Equilibrium whenever I do water changes or just once in a blue moon. I think that a severe imbalance of any of the nutrients will cause the same thing or something similar. 

Try again. You can keep some growing emersed in case this happens in your tank again. 

-Naomi


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## Cavan Allen (Jul 22, 2004)

Has the small form ever been flowered by anyone in the hobby? Nobody really seems to know its origin. It's rather different than what you see wild or in gardens and I'd be very interested in the result.


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