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The worst I have seen is on the old parts of the plants not the new leave or roots. I have not been spending loads of time in the tanks so things are a bit on auto pilot at the moment with them.

Later Ferdie

 

Seems like it has stopped eating from that plant that I have been keeping an eye on - still damage done !!!




On the good news side, I am seeing what I believe to be 2 and maybe even 3 submerged leaf growth.



Love that colour change ...









Later Ferdie

 

The root growth on some of these are just crazy.


I do see new roots from the leaf part of the stems, not so much form existing roots.



Not idea for how I tied these to the rocks but will be interesting if I end up dividing my first bunches.

Rest all seem to be doing OK. Most have now pushes at least 1 new leaf .. some I would say 3 maybe 4..

Cleared out some anubias from the back, needs to find some hardscape to do some filling.

I wonder what is happening here ... a split, 3 leaves or maybe maybe a flower ;-) now that will be cool considering how small the bits are that we started with.

Later Ferdie

 

Don't have much lying around .. so this will have to do for now.







Later Ferdie

 

Dropping the light cycle from what was post and pre sunrise / sunset

2017-03-23 19:21:01 Off
2017-03-23 10:17:01 On
2017-03-22 19:25:03 Off
2017-03-22 10:16:01 On

to "fixed" on / off times with a slight bit of randomness.

2017-03-28 15:39:01 Off
2017-03-28 09:04:01 On
2017-03-27 15:15:01 Off
2017-03-27 08:57:01 On
2017-03-26 15:26:01 Off
2017-03-26 09:00:01 On



Later Ferdie

 

Replaced the 12 volt supply, the previous model was starting to make a funny hmmmmmmmm ...



Some updates on the buce.

Think is it a flower and a leaf


Love the colour on that male












Hope the reduced light cycle works.

Later Ferdie

 

Not sure if I should be pleased about this, also not 100% sure what triggers the desire to flower. From what I have previously seen once the buce push a flower it can go a bit dormant, and you need to shake it up to get growth going again. Hope this was an exception and not the norm.





Leaf and root growth at this stage for me is good, flowering a bit of a waist for the resources to grow.
Later Ferdie

 

Some updates.










Later Ferdie

 

Nice growth on the Buce

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Back in-front of my own tanks, a real PC with a big keyboard, good to be home.

The other 1/4 was chief in charge of keeping the tanks going and she did a great job - I did reduce the light period on all the tank before the trip no issues what so ever while she was looking after the fish and the tanks. She even took some pics of the buce flowering.

April 22







April 29



May 1

 

So by the looks of things loads of the BUCE had flowers - was very lucky to see one actually bloom today.



and see some of the flower cups that remained

 

Looks extremely nice dude. I only had 2 that flowered, 1 submersed and 1 emersed, and it doesn't seem to stunt their growth. The only thing that set them back was the eating of new growth. Hope I removed the culprets, 2 flying foxes. Done their work on the hair algae so back to the lfs they went today. Hopefully that will end now. Have you sorted out your plant eater?

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Will need to do some inspection about the eater - looks OK I think.

With the reduces light cycle I suspect I stunted some new leaf growth. I am amazed at the number of flowers, it is almost as if every one of them is trying to flower over a few weeks.



Having now seen these in the wild, I have way more questions than answers. Clearly we are transforming the plants by doing 100% submerged growth. Question that I am playing with are what about a flash flood tank. Some thing that has huge level changes, light intensity transitioning during a typical day, streams and places I saw this in did not get the same amount of light all the time during the day - both intensity and colour. Water quality - typically I only saw the few that I saw in healthy "clear" streams - that always had other aquatic life. Them flowers - that is the intriguing part.



Even if we get them developing correctly above the water during "dry-time" seldom being flooded not in the monsoon season in the rain forest ( assumption on my part but extrapolating from chatting with locals ) are they truly so well in sync that they only flower at a specific time in a year, and how many times a year? Thinking back I have only seen flower once a year on my older plants but never pegged it as maybe it is season bound.

What will well developed flowers get us? Do I need to have specific bugs to pollinate them are they different in different areas etc



I am still trawling through the photos and the more I look the more questions I have, the more I would want to troll those streams more over a much much longer time period.



Later Ferdie

 

Maybe somebody can identify the bug and has some insight into what it is doing in the flower, just rest form the sun or something a bit more useful?



Later Ferdie

 

On what I have read up on Buce is that they are margenal, best word I can think of so early, aquatic plants. Meaning the grow submersed naturally, as you saw first hand. That is now during the dry season. But during the wet season they are emersed for a period.
Now speaking out of own experiance and observation I make the following conclusion on the flowering. When the flower pushes up it has that protective cone around it, assuming that this happens when flooded or constantly wet due to rain. As soon as the water levels drop the cone pops open to expose the flower for pollination. This is my own logical explanation for this as we bought our plants at about the same time and submersed them and flowering started after about 2 months.
So for practical reasons, for the plant and not us, it might be better to remove the plant for a period from the water and have it growing emersed for a few months before returning it.

Hope this sounds logical.

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It does, I wonder - if the cone does not also play its part in protecting the flower's development in the high humidity and not just for the submerged state. So the test is take some buce that has not flowered yet this year, move them to a higher humidity tank but let them leave now extent out the water. Lets see if we get that flower to develop as the trigger for the flood is over.

Later Ferdie

 

This is the one that is flowering at the moment which is grown emersed in my moss tank. Glass top so humidity is high.

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Stunning .. keep track of its flowering I suspect the stigma will look different to the that of a plant that flowers under water, but I could be wrong.

 

I will defnitly. Ever since I got the Buce they are my babies in the 3 tanks they are. Check them every morning and evening. To some it might sound like an obsession but to me it's kind of normal

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!!! Roger that ...