White Water Trumpet

Cryptocoryne albida

A small crypt with narrow red-brown leaves marked with dark patterns. It grows in very dim light, slowly and without fuss, and gives a tank a graceful line where bigger plants would be too much.

Light: low
Difficulty: easy
Height: 5 – 15 cm (2 – 5.9 in)
Temperature: 6 – 30 °C (43 – 86 °F)

Leaf colour: green, red +1 green, red, bronze or brown
Plant type: rosette
Growth rate: slow
CO₂ demand: low
Tolerates light: low – high
pH: 5 – 8
Carbonate hardness: 2 – 12 °dKH
General hardness: 0 – 30 °dGH
Placement: midground, foreground
Propagation: runners, rhizome division +2 runners, rhizome division, division, daughter plants
Grows emersed: yes

Appearance

Narrow leaves 1–3 cm wide and up to 15 cm long, with wavy edges and dark markings; colour goes from green to bronze-red under stronger light.

Keeping

Undemanding and very tolerant of shade — but in deep shade it grows extremely slowly. Like other crypts it dislikes being moved and may shed its leaves after planting, then grow them back. A nutritious substrate helps more than a brighter lamp.

Placement

The middle and front of the tank, in small groups where the narrow leaves contrast with broader ones.

Propagation

By runners, readily: young plants appear around the parent and can be cut away with their own roots. A mature clump may need thinning.

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: Cryptocoryne costata, Cryptocoryne albida 'Brown', Cryptocoryne albida costata

Scientific and other names, conservation status

Other scientific names: Cryptocoryne costata Gagnep., Cryptocoryne retrospiralis subsp. albida (R. Parker) Rataj, Cryptocoryne retrospiralis var. costata (Gagnep.) De Wit, Cryptocoryne costata, Cryptocoryne crispatula albida, Cryptocoryne hansenii, Cryptocoryne korthausiae, Cryptocoryne retrospiralis albida
Cryptocoryne albida: R. Parker
Family: Araceae
Conservation status: LC

White Water Trumpet

Tank conditions

Care and keeping