Algae in aquarium

One of the main aquarians’ problems is the plague of the lowest flora’s representatives. The fanciers of the slow-growing plants (e.g. Anubias) suffer the most. Sometimes they should wait many weeks when a new leaf will appear and study all phases of its’ development. But at the same time for several days algae can spoil the aspect of fanciers’ plants, which have been growing for years. At our forum there is a lot of information concerning the fighting with these undesirable “newcomers” and I try to sum it up.

First of all we should mention that there are a lot of types of algae. And the main cause of their appearance is the disturbance of biological balance, so it depends on thousand different factors: beginning with the composition and quantity of the aquatic animals and insects, flora, light intensity and so on. Sometimes algae can be the first sign of the aquarium’s “ripening” – drawing near to this notorious equilibrium. But generally you should look closely at appearance of the new guests and take necessary measures. I won’t stop at advices on how to create a planted tank and right away I come to the question: “What should we do if Anubias were attacked by the algae?” The representatives of the genus Compsopogon are the most dangerous for this plant. Usually people call them “black brush algae”. On the Anubias’ leaf they appear as black points or brushes and we can find them at the margin of the leaf. It’s very difficult to remove these weeds mechanically, only with leaf’s tissue or with the whole leaf, but many aquarians can’t do this. The simple way out is the usage of the biological methods. For example, you can get shrimps of the genus Caridina or snails - Theodoxus, Clithon or Neretina - and they will mop up the algae. But we can’t use them in all cases, e.g. for African Cichlids, because these shrimps and snails can be eaten by these fish. The usage of the larger “algae eaters”, e.g. Crossocheilus siamensis is less efficient. Also the rumor, that the best method is Anubias’ transfer from submerged into a semi-submerged conditions, only delude people. First of all, Compsopogon doesn’t disappear from the leaves, it only dries on their tissue and very often it grows well in a semi submerged condition due to the high humidity. So take into consideration all aforesaid, we can say that the chemical methods of fighting with algae could be used and are nowadays widespread.

In Russia the usage of cheap household chemicals, which contain sodium hypochlorite, became very popular. Short-term washing out (30-60 sec.) of the Anubias’ leaves with this water solution leads to the dying-off of the “black brush”. More than that the tissue of the leaves are protected with the well-formed cuticle, that’s why they can’t be damaged. In this connection we should avoid any contacts between hypochlorite and roots or growing points of the plant. After treatment leaves should be well washed under running water. The oxidized parts of the algae will flake from the leaves in aquarium in 2-3 days after treatment and become delicacies for many fishes, e.g. for callichthyid catfishes. In conclusion it stands to mention that you should handle all household chemicals only in accordance with safety instructions on the package.

The authors of this note: Dmitry Loginov.

The author used infos from the next Web pages:

(http://www.tropica.ru/forum/index.php?showtopic=18300, http://www.tropica.ru/forum/index.php?showtopic=22808)

Translated from Russian by Julia Niklyaeva and Alexander Grigorov

Photos: Eugeniy Tochenov, Alexander Grigorov and Vladislav Elbakyan.

© Dmitry Loginov

© Alexander Grigorov

The first mention of Anubias in scientific literature

Attention! This posting - exept of Schott's notice - is a fiction and should be accepted ONLY as author's subjective vision of reality.

In 1857 Henry Shott, the court gardener and botanist of the Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph I, received a parcel from Sweden. The sender was Elias Magnus Fries, the director of the museum and university’s botanic garden in Uppsala. In a wooden box among other various plants and their descriptions was a little wilted plant, which had been traveled several thousands kilometers to Vienna. There was a list of the plants in the covering note, but in front of this specimen was a dash. Fries commented that this plant was a part of Adam Afzelius’ collection and Uppsala University bought this collection from Afzelius’ relatives after his death. The aged Fries wasn’t interested in African “inheritance” of Afzelius, mushrooms were always his scientific ardour. As he knew that the Austrian liked the flora of the Dark Continent, he sent several plants to him. In his turn H. Shott didn’t think a lot and gave the novice of the Aracea family an imposing name – “Anubias”, in honor of the ancient Egyptian God of the dead, Anubis. On 27 November 1757 Shott sent a short note “Essays about the Arum family”- (in German “Aroideen-Skizzen”) about the new genus to the “Wiener Botanisches Wochenblatt”. So the first mention about the most popular Aquarian plant had appeared in scientific literature. Here is the whole article.

Essays about the Arum family

Henry Shott

Only one plant should deserve our special attention among the plant which Afzelius had collected in Sierra Leone. It’s very difficult to ascertain, whether this plant grows on the ground or trees, because the specimen is deficient. But only leaf and its rib, wrapped veil of the cop show us that it is a new genus and the further study of the flower proves that. We think that we haven’t any right to conceal from the scientific community this interesting specimen from the less known corner of the Earth and that’s why we sent a description of this plant’s peculiarities with the most visible specific traits, for that we thank the honorable Elias Fries.

A n u b i a s. Spatha cylindrice-voluta, lamina hiante. Spadix spatham excedens, ubique organis tectus, inferne ovaries, medio synondrodiis, reliqua parte synandriis apicem (inflorescentiae) versus imperfectis obsitus. Ovaria bilocularia, loculamentis multiovulatis, ovulis e medio axeos exertis, longule-funiculatis, hemianatropis, micropyle tholispectante. Stylus brevissimus. Stigmaconvexo-diseoideum, Synandria truncata, loculis quam connective brevioribus. Synandrodia synandriis similia.

Anubias Afzelii. Peliolus 5--6 pollicaris, lenuis, ultra medium vaginatus, apice in geniculum longulum transiens. Lamina fol. elongato-lanceolata, peliolo multo-longior, inferne cuneala, el ima basi abrupte cure geniculo juncta, apice longe-acuminala, venis arcualo-patentibus, creberrimis, approximatis, hinc inde confluenlibus, pseudoneuris in ipso margine 2-bus, venulis tran

sversis, copiosissimis, approximatissimis, tenuissimis in strucla. Pedunculus 9-10 pollices lonqus

, tenuis. Spatha bipollicaris, apice repentiaocontracta, apiculata. Spadix tenuis, spatham 6ta parte superans breviter-stipitalus. Habit. in Sierra-Leone (Afzelius).

Schönbrunn, 27 November 1857

The author of this note: Alexander Grigorov.

The author used infos from the next Web page.

Translated from Russian by Julia Niklyaeva and Alexander Grigorov

Photos: Dmitry Loginov

© Alexander Grigorov

© Dmitry Loginov

Anubias gilletii – the pearl of the home greenhouse

In my opinion Anubias gilletii is one of the most beautiful representatives of its genus. The laminae of this plant have a tribolate structure and are grown up horizontally to the surface on the long (up to 60 cm), graceful petioles. The rhizome is up to 1 cm in a cross section. The petioles are situated on it very closely to each other and are grown up to the light source. This picture looks like a beautiful bunch of cut flowers in vase. Small prickles on the petioles are looked like roses’ prickles. More than that Anubias gilletii has riotous flowering practically during the whole year. On my plant I could observe up to 7 inflorescences at the same time. Like most of the large anubias, the length of the flower stock is substantially smaller as the length of the petioles, so the flower ripens under the canapy.

If we looked at Anubias gilletii with the eye of a taxonomist here is also everything quite, calm and beautiful. Perhaps it’s a unique case among large Anubias species , which doesn’t give rise to doubt in a generic denomination. We can find only one species of this plant on the post-Soviet territory, this species I described above. Practically there is no information about this anubias in Internet. There are photos from the botanic garden in Lyons (France), but the leaf form of the depicted Anubias gilletii is quite differ from ours. So due to riotous flowering we could get to know the structure of the inflorescence in detail. Particularly the photos which were made by S. Gerasimov show that thekas are situated on synandria’ edges, which consist of 3-5 adnate stamens. The same structure of the inflorescence’s male part is described in W. Crusio’s revision. But in our case the quantity of the female flowers is more – up to 60 (in revision 20-30). More than that W. Crusio described that his specimens of Anubias gilletii had stolons. But we haven’t yet seen such laterals of this plant and of other Anubias species too. Though, I think that such differences are insignificant, which we can attribute to the lack of the information, concerning this West African plant.

There are not so many negative qualities of Anubias gilletii. For example, the growth in a submersed condition isn’t so good . But we can see some cases, when this plant has been cultivated in aquarium during a year. Besides in spite of the fact, that Anubias gilletii has riotous and regular flowering at home greenhouse, it’s very difficult to achieve the aging of pollen. Due to the high air humidity (about 98%), which is arisen in small aquaria or paludaria; there is the fast rotting and decomposition of the male part cop’s tissue.

The author of this note: Dmitry Loginov.

The author used information from the next Web page

Translated from Russian by Julia Niklyaeva and Alexander Grigorov

Photos: Sergey Gerasimov, Dmitry Loginov and Valentina Romanova.

© Dmitry Loginov
© Alexander Grigorov

Wim Crusio: "The only reason why I chose to distinguish 5 varieties in A. barteri was purely pragmatic" (an "Amazonas"-Interview) – Part II

“Amazonas”: Recently we have discussed a morphological feature, that is not presented in your revision. In this сonnection we would like to ask one more question: One of the distinguishing morphological features of Lagenandra genus is the involute vernation, in which both margins on opposing sides of the leaf are rolled up. All Anubia have the convolute vernation, it means the leaf is rolled from one margin. But leaves of different species are rolled up in different ways (clockwise or counterclockwise). What determines the direction of leaves' rolling up? Is this feature stable within this species?

Wim Crusio: Well, I have to admit that I never looked at this! I don't know whether this feature is stable within species. In general, very few plant species (and even rather few animal species) are lateralized, so I would not be surprised if this feature would be determined more or less randomly for each individual clone. In culture, species may appear to be less variable than they are in reality, because we may see many different plants, but they probably belong to only a few clones.

“Amazonas”: What do you think is the place of the plant under the trade name "Anubias coffeefolia" in the taxonomy of Anubias? Is it a new species or an artificially grown hybrid?

Wim Crusio: I have never seen the plant alive, only on photos. I think it is one of the many variants of A. barteri. I have seen many collections of this species from the wild and it is extremely polymorphic.

“Amazonas”: Among all species of Anubia only Anubias barteri var. nana is successfully grown being fully submersed. This feature is passed on to all interspecific hybrids of this Anubias. In this сonnection there are some suppositions about the existence of a certain gene responsible for this feature (an ability to grow being submerged into the water for a long time). What do you think about it?

Wim Crusio: As a geneticist, I strongly doubt that one single gene could be responsible for such a complex character as being able to live submerged. As far as I know, A. heterophylla has been kept submerged with success, too, as is the case with most (or even all) varieties of A. barteri.

“Amazonas”: To what species would you refer this Anubias (On the picture you can see a mature Anubias more than 2 years of age)? What do you think is the reason for Anubia leafstocks sometimes having unusual (reddish-brown or red) colouring?

Wim Crusio: This looks like either A. barteri var. angustifolia or a very narrow-leafed form of A. afzelii. You will have to compare the size of the inflorescence with the dimensions given in my revision. It is almost certainly the first one, though.

“Amazonas”: Anubia-fanciers noticed that the spatha of Anubias barteri subspecies can have a slightly lowered or volute end. your revision says that you cultivated many of Anubias genus. Have you faced such differences? What might it depend on? On conditions of plants growing? Or on the physiology of a particular plant?

A: Аnubias barteri var. caladiifolia with a slightly lowered end of the spatha, the first day of blooming. B: Anubias barteri var. nana: this is not the first day of blooming, but one can see that the spatha is not full volute.

Wim Crusio: To find out what causes these differences, one would need to breed these plants under different conditions and perhaps also produce crosses between them.

“Amazonas”: Some of us (Anubia-fanciers from Russia, Ukraine and Moldova) keep Anubias sp. Gabon. Do you know this plant?

The pictures of it are here

Wim Crusio: This is a form of A. barteri. Probably var. barteri.

“Amazonas”: Taxonomy is a relative science. As far as I know, modern taxonomists try to avoid such notions as "variety" and "subspecies", using only the notion "species". What do you think about it, taking into consideration the Anubias barteri case?

Wim Crusio:I agree with that completely. As I wrote in my revision, the borders that I drew between the different varieties are rather arbitrary. Somebody else would perhaps have drawn them differently or distinguished more (or fewer) varieties. It's a bit like distinguishing between tall and short people, they are extremes of the normal distribution, but within a given population, you can find the whole range from short to tall.

“Amazonas”: All the pistils of Anubias gracilis we have seen bevor were reddish-pink. Can the color be the key to the specification of the genus?

Wim Crusio: Perhaps. But A. gracilis appears to be very rare and it is very well possible that all plants in cultivation stem from the same clone. I have seen reddish-pink pistils also in A. hastifolia, I think. At this point, I actually have big problems drawing the border between barteri and gracilis...

“Amazonas”: What question was the most interesting or maybe difficult for you?

Wim Crusio: The most difficult question was the one about whether I still keep aquaria, because it made me feel nostalgic and I really would like to have some free time again to devote to this wonderful hobby!

Interview: Alexander Grigorov.

Photo: Sergey Gerasimov, Dmitry Loginov and Konstantin Ilyin.

© Alexander Grigorov