# Terrstrial plants sold as aquatic - WHY?



## kaegunim (Jan 15, 2010)

I have just been to a LFS, and seeing igor.kanshyn's post about purple krinkle got me to thinking about it.

I was looking through the (limited) plant selection there, and once again there were a row of lucky bamboo and a bunch of what I am positive were dracaena. These are not in any way aquatic plants, and not even march plants! The bamboo had been there on my last visit and is now looking pretty sickly, so hopefully no unsuspecting customer will buy it to be dissapointed when they get it home, but the dracaena were new additions and looked convincing enough.

The question is why were they there? There is not usually much signage - it does not explicitely say that these are aquatic plants, so I suppose that they are not falsely stating anything (though the fact that the plants are DISPLAYED underwater is misleading at the least)

Is the owner of the store just very poorly informed? Or maliciously trying to increase his or her profit margin by selling cheap terrestrial plants at aquatic plant prices? 

Alternately is the problem in the aquarium plant farming industry misrepresenting it's products to unsuspecting order-persons? (This I would believe in the case of the big box stores, at least...)

At any rate I am glad that I have done most of my plant aquisition from fellow hobbyists!


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## Aquatic Designs (Apr 2, 2006)

Asian plant famrs do not limit themsleves to just aquatic plants. They sell everything they can make money on. Most if not all farms i have ever dealt with have the plants in different sections of a list. Some times they are listed alphabeticly with abbreviations beside the plant name indicating whether its terrestrial or aquatic. 

However, the plants in question are commonly sold as semi aquatic. Or emergent. And FYI you can grow nearly any plant with it's roots in water. It's call hydroponics. So there are many people who can be blamed for misleading or mislabeling. But it all boils down to 2 things. Education and buyer beware.


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## Big Jim (Jan 7, 2010)

I saw some nice purple plants today called Dragon Flame or something like that. Didn't buy it because I wanted to find out the requirements first. Been seeing mixed feedback. Some say its not aquatic and others saying under the right conditions it is. I want to know what the conditions are if it is fully aquatic. Anyone know?


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## Calmer (Mar 9, 2008)

It seems not to be for submerged environments.
http://www.plantgeek.net/plant-239.htm
http://www.fishlore.com/fishforum/aquarium-plants/23520-dragon-flame.html

If you want something similar then check out Cryptocoryne blassii:
http://diszhal.info/english/plants/en_Cryptocoryne_blassii.php
It has a purplish colour under the leaves.

Or _Alternanthera reineckii_ but it takes high light   : http://www.google.ca/#hl=en&q=Alternanthera+reineckii+&meta=&aq=f&oq=Althernia+R&fp=b40b83f8bae2b677


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## qwerty (Dec 15, 2009)

Plants are pretty adaptable. Tomatoes and lettuce aren't aquatic either, but they grow great in hydroponic setups.

Most terrestrial plants that are sold as submerged aquatics are sold as such because they WILL survive and produce new leaves usually for a year or two... So as plants that you replace every couple years, they're kinda nice.

But actually many of the plants we in the hobby consider truly aquatic actually don't grow entirely submerged in the wild.

These plants are emersed growers, as most plants prefer to be. They get the humidity they require by being emersed, they get a constant supply of water for growth, and they also get the benefit of higher CO2 levels in the air than underwater, and the brighter sunlight they receive.

These plants only survive in our aquariums because in the wild, their habitat would regularly get flooded for several months of the year by rain, rising water levels, etc. So they had to adapt to survive being totally submerged.

Great example being java fern... Does really well in the aquarium, but in the wild never grows in water levels much above the rhizome...


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## bae (May 11, 2007)

qwerty said:


> Plants are pretty adaptable. Tomatoes and lettuce aren't aquatic either, but they grow great in hydroponic setups.


Hydroponics setups make sure the roots get adequate oxygen, which isn't the case in an aquarium substrate, or even a wet garden. Also, tomatoes and lettuce won't last long with their leaves submerged, or their roots in water-saturated soil.



> Most terrestrial plants that are sold as submerged aquatics are sold as such because they WILL survive and produce new leaves usually for a year or two... So as plants that you replace every couple years, they're kinda nice.


The time scale is more like weeks than months or years.



> But actually many of the plants we in the hobby consider truly aquatic actually don't grow entirely submerged in the wild.
> 
> These plants are emersed growers, as most plants prefer to be. They get the humidity they require by being emersed, they get a constant supply of water for growth, and they also get the benefit of higher CO2 levels in the air than underwater, and the brighter sunlight they receive.
> 
> ...


This is certainly true, but not all plants that grow emersed in nature are capable of surviving completely submerged. Spathiphyllum (peace lily) is a good example. It can be used as a sump plant with its roots completely underwater, but when it's not sold as a rather nice house plant, it's sold as an aquatic plant ('Brazilian sword plant') and doesn't survive much longer than any other terrestrial houseplants sold as such, e.g. Neantha bella, a small palm, dracaenas, etc.


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## qwerty (Dec 15, 2009)

> Hydroponics setups make sure the roots get adequate oxygen, which isn't the case in an aquarium substrate, or even a wet garden. Also, tomatoes and lettuce won't last long with their leaves submerged, or their roots in water-saturated soil.


Right, wasn't really thinking of substrate, woops, probably not the best example there... Guess hydroponics would really fall under emersed growth more than submerged anyways...



> The time scale is more like weeks than months or years.


Well that sucks then, doesn't it, lol... I thought people at least got some time out of these plants :-\


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