# [Wet Thumb Forum]-emergent plants



## kenmeyer (Jul 31, 2004)

Diana,
I see you mention emergent plants alot what are they? and what kind do you recomend? Also I bought a quick filter as you recommended do you leave it in your tank all the time or just when you do maintenance? What do you use for water movement? Thanks for all the help. 

P.S. I ordered your book today and am looking forward to reading it.


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## kenmeyer (Jul 31, 2004)

Diana,
I see you mention emergent plants alot what are they? and what kind do you recomend? Also I bought a quick filter as you recommended do you leave it in your tank all the time or just when you do maintenance? What do you use for water movement? Thanks for all the help. 

P.S. I ordered your book today and am looking forward to reading it.


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## sk8r_turned_aquarist (Mar 21, 2004)

Well, my name isn't _quite_ Diana but I'll give it a stab. "Emergent plants" refers to two things:
1)plants grown with only the roots and bottom part in water so as to utilize the atmospheric CO2
-or the definition you're probably looking for-
2)plants that grow out of the tank (rooted on the bottom, but are tall enough that they stick out of the tank).

my personal favorite is watersprite, it gets really big and grows pretty fast. Go to this URL and click on the pictures to enlarge them:
http://plantgeek.net/plantguide_viewer.php?id=53


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## feefeefish (Apr 5, 2004)

How can one tell the difference between watersprite and wisteria? Are they the same thing?


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## ~SP~ (May 30, 2004)

Wisteria (Hygrophylla) is a stem plant, watersprite is a fern, the first has a stem, the last hasn't.
In fact this two are quite different in reality, much more then at photo.


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

> quote:
> 
> Originally posted by kenmeyer:
> Diana,
> I see you mention emergent plants alot what are they? and what kind do you recomend? Also I bought a quick filter as you recommended do you leave it in your tank all the time or just when you do maintenance? What do you use for water movement? Thanks for all the help.


Hello Ken,

Any plant whose leaves are exposed to air is an emergent plant. Note that many submerged aquatic plants (Amazon swords, Cryptocoryne, almost all stem plants, etc) can be grown emergent. They grow much better when emergent. One reason is that they can access air CO2, but that is not the only reason. You'll learn more in my book.

As to the Quick Filters, I'm so happy with them, I keep them in my tanks all the time now. They are so much better and easier to work with than the canister filters I used to have.

I've started adding charcoal to the bottom plastic "cage". That seems to have reduced minor algae problems in my tanks. I assume it is because the charcoal will remove iron chelators and make iron less available for algae.

You'll have to read the book to understand all of this. Good luck!


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## kenmeyer (Jul 31, 2004)

Thank you,

I also recieved your book today so ill start reading as soon as I can


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## feefeefish (Apr 5, 2004)

Thank you!


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## Avalon (Mar 7, 2005)

Diana,

I also use a Hagen powerhead (802), and I find that the quick filter attachment an invaluable tool! I've been wrapping the plastic baskets in filter floss, but I've read (from you I think) that the filter pads made for it are superior due to the low micron filtration capability. I also remember reading a thread where someone commented (Roger Miller I think) that these pads can be cleaned and reused. My question is, how do you clean those pads? I must not be cleaning correctly, because they don't last very long after I rinse them out! Should I clean them using bleach like my Marineland HOT micron filter?

(So sorry...don't mean to hijack the thread!)


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## dwalstad (Apr 14, 2006)

> quote:
> 
> Originally posted by Avalon:
> Diana,
> ...


I just squeeze them hard several times. Roger hits them (with gusto) against a solid object!

Also, I bought a big roll of polyester filtering material for $3 that I cut out and wrap around the plastic cage. It works fine. As Roger has written, you can use this filtering material over and over again.

I think you should be the one to determine what you use in your Quick Filter. The beauty of these filters is that you can use them to do the job you want. If you want to get rid of the ich parasite and/or water turbidity, then use the manufacturer's filters that remove 1 micron-sized particles.

For routine filtration, you can use ordinary filtering material that filters out larger particles. I'm currently using material (ordinary rectangular sheets of polyester fiber) that filter out 100 micron particles. These work fine for rountine filtration.


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## DataGuru (Mar 11, 2005)

I went to a local garden center today and was amazed at the emergent plants they have in their ponds/greenhouse. Talk about a BUNCH of different emergent plants. My gosh. Most were too big for my tank. Oh well. I did get a cutting of water celery to pot. and some duckweed and azolla.

That's got me wanting to hang a light fixture, so I can have some *real* emergent plants in the 55 gallon. *chuckle*

I've read Diane recommending water lettuce in her book. Had only seen it in pics till today so I thought it was small like frogbit. Bought a couple of water lettuce today that have like 2 foot root systems. The root systems are beautiful--like white feathers floating in the current. Their leaves reach about 3 inches above the water level... maybe 4" across the leafy part of the plant. I actually had to jerry rig my tank lights up higher to get the darned things in the tank! Tho I suppose I could drop the water level--would get too much surface agitation that way tho.

NitrAte was 20ppm today (after like a 75% partial water change yesterday), so we'll see what happens.









Betty


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