Cryptocoryne

History

The first species of Cryptocoryne was described in 1779 under the name of Arum spiral by Retzius. The kind was described by Fischer in 1828. Nevertheless the scientific classification of the Cryptocoryne is very complicated and there are various opinions on this subject. Lagenandra is another kind very close to the Cryptocoryne .

Etymology

The name Cryptocoryne comes from Latin crypto , meaning “hidden”, and of the Greek koryne referring to the button of the flower.

Although the correct scientific name of the kind is Cryptocoryne , they are often indicated by the diminutive “Crypto”, in particular in the aquarists. The English name “ toilets Trumpet ” (water trumpet) refers to their Inflorescence, a Spadice surrounded by a Spathe (typical of this family), which resembles a trumpet.

List species

Cryptocoryne affinis
Cryptocoryne beckettii
Cryptocoryne cordata
Cryptocoryne crispatula
Cryptocoryne griffithii
Cryptocoryne lingua
Cryptocoryne longicauda
Cryptocoryne minima
Cryptocoryne pontederiifolia
Cryptocoryne purpurea
Cryptocoryne retrospiralis
Cryptocoryne spiralis (Retz.) Fisch. ex Wydler
Cryptocoryne thwaitesii
Cryptocoryne undulata
Cryptocoryne usteriana
Cryptocoryne walkeri
Cryptocoryne wendtii of Wit
Cryptocoryne ×willisii

Culture

Some Cryptocoryne are popular Plantes of aquarium. The immersed plants have a vegetative Reproduction, the crop plants with the free air could flower and be the subject of a sexuée Reproduction. Many species are only cultivated by specialized experts and are very difficult to maintain, or are not the subject of any culture. Some are Espèces threatened by disappearance of their habitat. Contrary, some Cryptocoryne (as Cryptocoryne beckettii ) are plants of aquarium very common, easy to make push, so much so that they became invasive after their introduction in Florida.

Some Cryptocoryne are among easiest to maintain (in fact species as Cryptocoryne wendtii are famous as being most changeable of the plants of aquarium); they ask a weak light moderate (but can push more quickly under a more intense light), a range of temperature around 20 with 33°C, and a pH slightly acid or neutral, even if they can also adapt to a higher pH. Contrary to what is often said by the aquarists, they thrive well in the water limestones. Many modern aquariums will be probably too enlightened so that of the “Crypto” thrive there.

The plants of the kind Cryptocoryne , from which the distribution extends from the India at the New Guinea, push under very variable conditions. Some are plants really liking acidity, as Cryptocoryne grabowski which one finds in the Tourbières with Borneo, whereas others, like Cryptocoryne balansae and Cryptocoryne pontiderifolia , push rather in rivers at calcareous bottom with earthy and alkaline water. A species, Cryptocoryne ciliata , meets even out of brackish water in certain zones. It is one of the rare plants of aquarium which tolerates salt concentrations which would kill the majority of the other plants of aquarium.

Jacobsen carried out a broad revision and much names to which the aquarists are accustomed were changed. The Cryptocoryne freely have also a tendency to hybrider in nature, which makes difficult taxonomy. A multitude of species which one finds in nature are in fact of the species Hybrides. By adding to that the fact that certain species have a multitude of cultivars (or Variétés) and that they can only be identified by their inflorescence (and they seldom flower out of aquarium), that makes difficult any identification based on their appearance.

The Cryptocoryne are used in aquariophilie since the end of the 18th century, even if until in the the Sixties, one knew some that a handle of species. Before this period, they were not really common.

Each year, several new species are discovered, because of the interest which they cause and increase in the number of private forwardings of collection.

They now have a commercial importance in the animalist trade and settled in nature with the the United States, in Jamaica and in other countries. Texas and Florida have all two of the well established populations and they are regarded there as invasive, without any method of control.

Loss of the sheets

When one plants news Cryptocoryne in an aquarium, one often meets a phenomenon called crypt melt in English: the plant loses all its sheets. With that two possible reasons:

the brutal change of environment disturbs the plant which can put up to thirty days to settle and which new growths appear. The most tested recommend not to plant of 'Cryptocoryne in an aquarium installed since less than three months.

in nature they push under water but in the Asian seedbeds where they are produced, they are often cultivated with the free air. In fact the loss of sheets appears at the time of the passage between the conditions emerged with immersed. There is recently a tendency of these seedbeds to send the Cryptocoryne in the form of Rhizome S (without the sheets) to reduce the dispatch costs and because the sheets will in any event fall once planted in the aquarium.

Other sources insist on the need for regularly changing the water of the aquarium to avoid the accumulation of nitrates which could be a release of this phenomenon (often regarded as a disease). Other tracks are also considered.

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