African Onion Plant

Crinum calamistratum

Very narrow, tightly curled dark green leaves growing out of a bulb — like green ribbons twisted along their whole length. Undemanding, and fish do not eat it.

Light: low
Difficulty: easy
Height: 40 – 120 cm (16 – 47 in)
Temperature: 12 – 30 °C (54 – 86 °F)

Leaf colour: green
Plant type: rosette
Growth rate: slow
CO₂ demand: low
Tolerates light: medium – high
pH: 5 – 8
Carbonate hardness: 2 – 12 °dKH
General hardness: 0 – 30 °dGH
Placement: background, midground +1 background, midground, specimen
Propagation: division, daughter plants
Grows emersed: no

Appearance

Leaves a few millimetres wide, curled into a spiral and long enough to reach the surface and lie along it. Deep green, and unusually firm to the touch.

Keeping

Easy: dim light is enough, carbon dioxide is optional and growth is slow. There is one rule shared by all bulb plants — do not bury the bulb completely, or it rots. Root feeding helps. Herbivorous fish leave the tough leaves alone, so it survives in tanks where softer plants do not. It also tolerates slightly brackish water.

Placement

The middle or back of the tank, alone or as a pair — the curling leaves are what you look at, and a crowd of them turns into a tangle.

Propagation

A settled plant grows daughter bulbs beside the main one; separate them once they have their own leaves.

Water conditions match

The water suits 1008 of 1249 species in the catalogue — these are the ones people look up most often.

Swordtail Guppies Cobra Guppy Blood Red Molly Butterflyfish Red Zebra Cichlid Julii Corydoras Red-finned Parotocinclus Gastromyzon monticola Egg-shaped Goldfish Flame Tetra Gardner's Killifish African Tetra Kenyi Cichlid Cuckoo Catfish Golden Swordtail Hypsolebias picturatus Common Zacco Labeo Bicolor Gambusia Flying barb Gastromyzon scitulus Albino Zebra Danio Geophagus Brokopondo Zebra Mbuna

Will eat this plant

These species damage plants, especially when their diet is short of vegetable food.

Bengal Loach Zebra Loach Burmese Border Loach Emperor Botia Spined Loach Marbled Headstander Pellegrin's Leporinus Leporinus striatus False Black Tetra Common Metynnis Mylossoma duriventre Red Whiptail Catfish Molly sphenops Balloon Molly Lyretail Molly Marble Molly Hi-Fin Platy Hawaii Platy Blue Platy Pintail Platy Black Platy Chocolate Molly Moonlight Gourami Melanotaenia parva

Will uproot it

These species dig through the substrate and pull rooted plants out.

Marble Loach Peacock Eel Forktail Loach Guntea Loach Long-nosed Loach Horseface Loach Pearlscale Black Moor Goldfish Shubunkin Painted Pleco Featherfin Synodontis Reddish Mystus Catfish Blue Acara Aulonocara maylandi Aulonocara multicolor Aulonocara Orchid Geophagus altifrons Geophagus winemilleri Pearlscale Cichlid Pearl Cichlid Redbelly Cichlid Red-spotted Cichlid Chuco godmanni Haplochromis philander Red Chromide Jack Dempsey cichlid

Matching water does not mean the fish will leave the plant alone.

The same plant with a different look: light, water and care are shared with the species.

Other varieties: Crinum calamistratum Topf

Scientific and other names, conservation status

Crinum calamistratum: Bogner & Heine
Family: Amaryllidaceae

African Onion Plant

Tank conditions

Care and keeping