Rotala macrandra Pearl

• 

  Macrandra
• Green
• Bangladesh

• 

  Mini Butterfly
• PearlThis page
• Narrow Leaf

Care at a glance

Overview

A demanding little stem for the foreground or midground of high-tech tanks, especially nanos, where a group reads as a fine-textured green, pink and purple cushion. It needs stable CO2, soft water and complete fertilization, and strong light keeps the growth compact and colored. Growth is slower than the big macrandra forms and the stems are just as fragile, so handle and trim gently, replanting only healthy tops with the typical small leaves. Watch for reversion shoots with larger wild-type foliage and cut them out as soon as they appear, or they will overgrow the pearl form. CO2 swings show up quickly as stunted, twisted tips.

In the wild

Pearl is an aquarium selection, apparently a mutant of Rotala macrandra 'Green', and has no wild population of its own. The wild type Rotala macrandra grows in marshes, ditches and ricefields in South India, in warm, soft, slightly acidic water, both emersed on wet mud and submersed.

Good to know

A dwarf selection of Rotala macrandra in the family Lythraceae, also traded as Rotala sp. 'Pearl'. It carries some of the smallest leaves of any macrandra form, a few millimeters long and curved downward, which separates it from the similar 'Mini Type 2'. As a mutant it is not entirely stable and occasionally throws shoots that look like the wild type.

Did you know

Pearl is genetically unstable in a useful direction: it arose as a mutant, and it will happily mutate back. Keeping the variety true means patrolling the bush and removing every wild-type shoot before it takes over.

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• 

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