SouthEastern Texas Wetlands

The green plant in post #14 has leaf veination consisting of parallel main veins going back to the base of the leaf and leaf margins that exclude it as a Ludwigia, even the woody ones like L. alternifolia (which does not grow submersed). L. repens doesn't grow that rigidly or have such long internodes either. You're right that many plants look drastically different above and below water, but that does have limits. The reddish plant on the right could well be a Ludwigia, but they aren't the same plant.

As far as the difference between L. palustris and L. repens goes, the former usually has longer petioles, somewhat narrow leaves and flowers with no petals. Leaf texture is a tad different too, but that's a bit tough to describe. Finally, if you've seen enough of it enough times out collecting when you were hoping to see something else for a change...

HMMM....come down to Florida and give me a field trip! Housing provided. Hopefully I will have a DEP permit by then.Does your profession involve plants? Or do you just research. If so where and how? Do you use keys? I find therm drastically intimidating.

I envy you guys living near ditches and in warm weather. [smilie=b: Would like to move there some time...

Dave your are a real plant :nerd:! I tell my kids to stay away from ditches and here you are diving in.... I am glad you work in a place where you can feed your habit. In Houston, we have the concrete "bayous" which are pretty nasty and not conducive to aquatic plants, though I often see schools of fish swimming around in there.

These plants you found must be tolerant to heat and cycles of emersion and submersion. Were these brackish waters?

Bunbuku,

No, fresh water only, and I'm 90% sure the areas I looked in were not flooded with sea-water during Hurricane Ike. The couple plants that have yet to be ID'd (#3 and the grass) I've got in my tank growing out. They may turn out to be non-aquatics that can survive submerged for long periods (like botton-bush or some sedges, or some random plant I've not seen before) .

If you want to try some of these out in a tank let me know and I'll bring samples to the Jan NASH mtg. I'll be updating with results from what is in my tank and I'm sure I'll be looking for more plants to try out.

-Dave

Wow. Awesome find. You are lucky to have such place near you ( "just outside the office").
Thanks a lot for sharing. Keep us posted of your discoveries.

free plants in your own backyards?! I can't believe it, I wonder if we have anything like that in Southern California, it has always been a fantasy of mine to go to aquatic plant collecting.

Darksome said:

free plants in your own backyards?! I can't believe it, I wonder if we have anything like that in Southern California, it has always been a fantasy of mine to go to aquatic plant collecting.

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It really is great fun! Just this Thursday I found some Proserpinaca pectinata (Comb-leaf Mermaid weed) and some more L. glandulosa while at work. No pictures because the camera died and I couldn't get "natural" photos. But I'll go back there and get some good shots in a few weeks.

-Dave

It must be nice living near all that water, out here in the desert the only place you'll find aquatic plants is a lake or the fish store lol!! Even the canals out here are concrete

Valthenya said:

It must be nice living near all that water, out here in the desert the only place you'll find aquatic plants is a lake or the fish store lol!! Even the canals out here are concrete

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I know how you feel (well, almost). When we lived up by Abilene there were NO aquatic plants at all. I remember getting excited when I found some Potamogeton nodosus in a pond once. It didn't make much of an aquarium plant because all the leaves quickly went to the surface and floated, but it was all I could find locally. Now, here in the high rain-fall/warm climate, I can find TONS of cool stuff.

lol i live in phoenix btw not much rainfall at all as a matter of fact i think we are technically in a drought (ten years i think...)

Keep in mind the Houston PlantFest this coming April you should be able to go back home with many new plants!

davemonkey said:

It really is great fun! Just this Thursday I found some Proserpinaca pectinata (Comb-leaf Mermaid weed) and some more L. glandulosa while at work. No pictures because the camera died and I couldn't get "natural" photos. But I'll go back there and get some good shots in a few weeks.

-Dave

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Got any pics? Not being familiar with this particular species, I googled it, and the pics are very similar to some of my locally collected P. palustris. My palustris has leaves which can be quite variable, in some cases looking very similar to the pic I saw of the pectinata. I wonder if the pectinata is also variable?

Cavan, you out there??

Bert H said:

Got any pics? Not being familiar with this particular species, I googled it, and the pics are very similar to some of my locally collected P. palustris. My palustris has leaves which can be quite variable, in some cases looking very similar to the pic I saw of the pectinata. I wonder if the pectinata is also variable?

Cavan, you out there??

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I'm going back out there on Friday. If it's dry enough to get to the spot I'll get some natural photos. Either way, I'll post some pics of what I threw in my tank to show a side-by-side comparison.

I'm sure it can have variable growth here, I just noticed the little "nutlets" on the aquaplant website (or was it Aquatic and Invasive Plants...whichever one is the Florida site) and saw a few old ones on some stems I tossed. Just in case, I'm growing a couple stems emersed. (EDIT Note: I actually never bothered to look and see is P.palustris also has nutlets...DANG...that throws a wrench in my ID.)

-Dave

davemonkey said:

Compare these plants to the Proserpinaca palustris above. I think these are P. pectinata, but I can no longer confirm it as I didn't save any seeds/nuts and there were none left when I got out there yesterday. The specs of this particular site: frequently flooded soils, there was a 2-month dry spell where most of the plants were left above water and began forming emergent growth. The pictures were all taken 2 days after a 5" rain. I'll post pics of other plants in a new post.

-Dave

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One of these days I will try to take some close up pics of my palustris. Part of the stem will have leaves very siimilar to what the pics here show, then another part of the stem, usually higher up, will look different.