International Aroid Society

To expand on the techniques Julius mentions for growing aquatic aroids, here is how we grow seedlings of the cold-sensitive giant Victoria water lilies in a greenhouse in the winter to give them a head-start before planting them in the outdoor ponds when the weather warms up. I have great luck including my pots of Cyrtosperma, Montrichardia, Lasia, Lasiomorpha, Anubias, etc in these tanks during the winter.

We use a 10 foot diameter galvenized stock tanks used for watering cattle (they are about two feet deep, don't know exactly, and don't know how much water they hold) inside a greenhouse. To heat the water, we use a "backpack" style mini water heater normally intended for use in RV's/campers. An ordinary water pump made for pond waterfalls is connected to the heater via flexible tubing, and this pumps water from the tank into the water heater. The heated water is then routed back into the tank through PVC pipe, directing the water away from the intake pump in a direction that circulates the water all the way around the tank in a circular pattern back towards the pump.

With the volume of water in the above mentioned tank, it is not effective to wait until the water is cold before turning the water heater on, as it is unable to heat it up sufficiently in a relatively quick manner. This might be different if a smaller volume of water was used. A tank located in a sunny greenhouse will collect a lot of heat during the day that gradually gets released through the night, and therefore having the heater run continuously 24 hrs/day will do a great job at maintaining the warm water temperatures through the night. The heater we use has a built-in thermostat so it isn't constantly running, switching off during the warmer portions of the day. With this method, in an unheated greenhouse the water will be around 78 degrees Farenheight when it is below freezing outside. Of course there are a number of factors to consider - greenhouse size, sun exposure (heat build-up during the day), volume of water vs capacity of water heater, daytime high temperatures outside of greenhouse, supplemental ambient heating in greenhouse, etc. This is our experience in northern Florida where we regularly experience a number of nightly hard freezes each winter.

As an added benefit, this method can be used as supplemental heating for a smaller greenhouse, reducing the energy demands on traditional greenhouse heaters that are controlled by thermostats. Quite a bit of heat is released into the greenhouse through the night from the warm water. Supplemental heat may not be even necessary during mild cold snaps in a smaller greenhouse, depending on the ratio of water volume to the size of the greenhouse.

For anyone who wants to keep a large collection of tropical aquatic aroids and other plants, this is a good option for at least overwintering. This method could easily be adapted to a more natural looking in-ground greenhouse pond as well. In addition to the heat, the continuous water circulation surely benefits the plants. Though aquatic plants are often growing in seemingly anaerobic conditions in nature, stagnant conditions in artificial situations (pots) can be fatal to many aquatic plants.

-----Original Message-----
From: ju-bo@msn.com
Sent: Sep 27, 2009 9:42 AM
To: aroid-l@gizmoworks.com, crogers@ecoanalysts.com, dbiggs@xantusidesign.net
Subject: Re: [Aroid-l] ?? Water-loving Anthurium species

Dear All Aquatic aroid lovers,

Another note w/ info. on the group of aroids I love best.
A special 'hello' to Christopher ''the Younger'' Rogers and to Devin, there will be a few snippets in this which apply to both of you.
First off, Christopher, cultivate the contacts w/ my dear friend Jay Vaninni in Guatemalea, he is THE man concerning info. on most obscure aroids and growing methods, especially Anthurium and Philo. sps.!   Dr. Tom Croat, in one of his talks last w/end paid tribute to Jay and his knowledge. He if anyone can tell you how to grow A. amnicola, though I`ll give a suggestion on a method I used with a VERY difficult to cultivate Caladium cf. picturatum which grows under very wet/swampy conditions. Jay`s invaluable observations and information is below!
OK--Devin, I have not heard from you as yet as to IF you have acess to back issues of the older Aroideanas or Deni Bown`s EXCELLENT book on aroids, but there is info. that you need to read on growing aquatics in them.   Two articles come to mind, both by me. In Aroideana Vol. 16, pgs. 33-36, "Experiencing Urospathas", and in Aroideana Vol. 20, pgs.13-26, "Observations on New World Araceae-Lasieae''. In them you will find good information on the cultivation methods I used to grow these usually most difficult plants to show-winning specimens. Some of these plants, plus the Asian genus Cyrtosperma, are in MY opinion the KINGS of all aquatic aroids.
Later on I`ll give info. on some improvements made to these methods by Enid and Sam of "Natural Selections Exotics" (www.NSExotics.com).
Your method of cultivation of aquatic aroids in aquariums does limit what species can be grown, you can grow only the smaller species, while some/many aquatic aroids grow to be close to 6'+ (up to 18'!) in height!   If you have a green house, and by incorporating Enid`s method, many of the larger species CAN be grown in cooler/cold areas as long as you have the space inside your greenhouse.   Most do NOT tollerate cool/cold air temps. AND cool water, but there are ways to overcome this.
Devin---first off, I have been thinking of SMALLER species of aquatic aroids, both native AND exotic which would be fantastic if obtained and grown under your aquarium conditions.   The most beautiful and interesting Orontium aquaticum (a.k.a. "golden club", a native) and a small specimen of Peltandra (native) should work well!
On the exotic side, ask around for Colocasia affinis and others in this group.   They are remarkably beautiful SMALL wild Asian species (10" tall max.??), and grow very well with ''wet'' roots. Their beautifully marked leaf blades rival in markings and beauty the much larger Colocasia ''illustrus" in your photographs, Google them?? Our friend Pete Boyce may be able to give some info. on species, etc., and maybe Enid just MIGHT either have specimens for sale or might know of a source, I`ve seen them in collections from time to time around S. Florida.
The beautiful Caladium steudnerifolium (Ecuadorian, but up to 30" tall) also grows wet, in nature it is sometimes seen with its roots actually growing in flowing streams, I am told. Enid may have this.
The method I used to grow a good, undamaged specimen of the swamp-loving Caladium sp. was to pot the plant in a well-draining mix, in the pots bottom was about 3" of larva rock. I put about 2" of pea-gravel in a LARGE shallow plastic saucer (30" dia.?), I kept the saucer 1/2 filed with water and placed the pot in its center on the pea gravel/water with only about 1/2" of the potted plants bottom in the water. The very high humidity created by water in the large saucer seemed to keep the plants most delicate leaves from drying out and ''curling'' at the edges. (Devin, Steve Lucas might have plants of this Caladium sp. from me, VERY sagittate leaves, lilac v-markings, ask him), it WILL grow wet
Enids method of growing the larger Urospatha and Cyrtosperma sps. VERY well during the cooler Florida months, when the temp. of the water in the necessary saucers got cool/cold, causing the roots of these delicate plants to die, and the cooler air temps. caused the beautiful leaves to dry and look bad, was/is as follows.   She and Sam set up some large plastic ''kiddie pools'' and some smaller ''cement mixing containers", maybe 4' X 4' by 12" deep (availble at H/Depot, etc.)   They added about maybe 5" of water in these containers, plus a cheap aquarium water heater AND one of those cheap ''pumps'' which are commonly used to circulate the water of marine fish tanks with which to move the heated water around.   The actual potted plants were placed on bricks (with spaces between the bricks) so that only say 1" - 2" of their bottoms, sitting ON the bricks, were actually IN the water. (and these potted plants had about 3" of larva rock in THEIR bottoms, so NO soil was under water!).   This set-up allowed the warm (NOT HOT!) heated water to circulate, and rising heat in the cool g/house prevented a LOT of damage to their leaves from the cool/cold air from occuring! The aquatics I saw growin under these conditions in the cool Florida winter were just fantastic!
Enough for now.

Good Growing, and good luck!

Julius Boos,

W.P.B., FLORIDA

From: heloderma5@hotmail.com
To: aroid-l@gizmoworks.com
Date: Thu, 24 Sep 2009 12:18:51 -0600
Subject: Re: [Aroid-l] ?? Water-loving Anthurium species

Not sure if the list accepted a post from my other mail-server....a thousand pardons if this post is duplicated.

Greetings:

The images mentioned on the UBC website are mine, taken near El Guabal on the Caribbean versant of Veraguas Prov. Panama in late October 2007. According to an unpubl. (?) treatment of rheophytic anthuriums that Dr. Croat provided me some years back, A. rupicola is the lone member of Sect. Porphyrochitonium that survives his taxonomic revision of these puppies...all the other taxa mentioned are now considered to be Sect. Calomystrium. Having grown, wild-collected and propagated some of these spp. I happen to agree with this arrangement. Previously, all of these lance-leaf Anthurium spp. (incl. well-known ones such as amnicola and antioquiense) were also considered to be part of Sect. Porphyrochitonium and are treated as such by Kamemoto and Kuehnle in their '96 work on breeding ornamental anthuriums.

I have encountered the fully aquatic Spath mentioned both at the locality and in fast-flowing, boulder-strewn lowland streams flowing into the Caribbean in Omar Torrijos NP in Cocl=C3=A9. Plants are identical in general appearance to the rheophytic anthuriums being discussed, always deeply-rooted in gravel bottoms and always growing in less than 90 cm (3') of water, usually at depths less than 60 cm (2') near the edge. I remember that I found a name for this plant way back when, but Mr. Alzie eroding my memory...Dr. Croat will no doubt be able to provide a binomial for those interested.

I grow antioquiense, amnicola and rupicola. Easy but extremely sensitive to drying out between waterings (natch!).

I believe that a hort hybrid between antioquiense and amnicola that was developed years back at U Hawaii is (was?) circulating in SoFlo as true antioquiense...they tend to exhibit the lilac background color of the amnicola parent, the greater size and vigor of antioquiense, but are not noticeably fragrant at anthesis.

As has been mentioned elsewhere, my observations in seasonally-flooded areas of upper Amazonia coincide with others...that PLENTY of terrestrial plants (including some Anthurium spp.) spend many months with there roots and lower stems fully submerged and are clear candidates for culture in (large) paludariums. Beyond this, I did collect an apparently undescr. cordate-leaf sp. of anthurium in eastern Per=C3=BA that was rooted smack in the middle of a permanent stream. Seed from this taxon was distributed to some people on this forum in 2001 and it is my understanding that Lynn Hannon donated her collection of these plants to MOBOT prior to her passing, so it may persist in culture at that BG. I still keep a few here for laughs.

Cheerio,

> From: dbiggs@xantusidesign.net
> To: aroid-l@gizmoworks.com
> Date: Mon, 21 Sep 2009 21:02:59 -0400
> Subject: [Aroid-l] ?? Water-loving Anthurium species
>
> Hi All,
>
> I recently ran into a thread on the UBC Botanical Garden Forums which mentioned several terrestrial Anthurium species that occur in
> very wet situations in nature, including river banks and streamside rocks. The roots of these anthuriums might grow right in the water
> or in very wet media for extended periods or permanently. I am on the hunt for Anthurium that grow well in saturated soils and wonder
> if anybody can help me to source some of these plants(?).
>
> Here are some of the species mentioned in those forum posts:
>
> A. amnicola
> A. antiquiense
> A. riparium
> A. rivularis
> A. rupicola
> A. sagittatum
> A. werfii
>
> Is there a technical terms to describe plants that grow on rocks with their roots in the water? There are a number of aquarium plants
> that use such habitats.
>
> Thanks for considering this. I really would like to hear any ideas for sources that might come to mind. Incidentally, a post in that same
> thread also mentioned that "both amnicola and rupicola grow in sympatry with a fully aquatic Spathiphyllum sp.". I have never heard of
> any fully-aquatic Spathiphyllum, and I would really like to know more about that too.
>
> Thanks very much!
>
> Regards,
>
> Devin
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