Ludwigia Senegalensis

This one reached the hobby as Ludwigia sp. Guinea, after the country the first imports were said to come from. Flowgrow now files it as Ludwigia senegalensis and describes a wild plant that is widespread across tropical Africa, from Senegal to Angola and east to the Zambezi in northern Zambia, growing emersed and submersed in wet places up to 1100 m. The origin of the cultivated stock still carries a question mark on the page.

People buy it for the leaf, a brick red blade with a vein pattern that Flowgrow says sets it apart from other stem plants. What they find out afterwards is that the same page rates the plant difficult, and means it.

Micronutrients are the failure point. The page says to dose about double what the manufacturer recommends, because a shortage blackens the shoot tips and can kill them outright. Macronutrients want to be generous too, roughly 20 mg/l nitrate and 2 to 3 mg/l phosphate. Light has to be strong, and a shaded corner is the wrong place for this plant. Soft water appears to suit it, which fits a published carbonate hardness of 0 to 7 dKH.

The optimum is 20 to 25 °C at pH 4.5 to 7 under high light. Even with everything right, growth is only moderate, which is why this entry now reads medium instead of slow. It throws plenty of lateral shoots, so cuttings are easy; just do not plant a group too densely, or the stems stay small and shed their lower leaves. Flowgrow publishes a CO2 range of 25 to 40 mg/l and no text about how the plant behaves without injection, so the required label here is inherited rather than sourced. There is no height row either, and the 25 cm is editorial.