White Albida

Cryptocoryne albida is a highly variable species from southern Myanmar and Thailand, part of the Cryptocoryne crispatula group. This aquarium plant is sold under the trade name White Albida. Older literature carries it under the names Cryptocoryne costata and Cryptocoryne retrospiralis subsp. albida, and the common name is the white water trumpet.

In the aquarium it makes a rosette that suits the midground, or the front of a larger tank planted as a group. Growth is slow and care is easy.

Light is listed from low to high, the optimum is 22 to 29 °C, and the temperature tolerance runs from 6 to 30, which places the species well outside the tropical band most crypts are held to. pH is 5 to 8, carbonate hardness 2 to 12 dKH, and carbon dioxide 10 to 40 mg/l. It spreads by runners once settled, and can also be divided at the rhizome or split, and it grows emersed like the rest of the genus.