Red-stem Parrot's Feather

Myriophyllum rubricaule

The parrot's feather with red stems, sold for decades as a pond plant before anyone settled what it was. Known only from cultivation, and very fast in a tank.

Light: medium–high
Difficulty: easy
Temperature: 4 – 28 °C (39 – 82 °F)

Leaf colour: green, red
Plant type: stem plant
Growth rate: very fast
Tolerates light: medium – high
Carbonate hardness: 2 – 14 °dKH
Placement: background, midground
Propagation: cuttings
Grows emersed: yes

Appearance

Whorls of fine leaves on a distinctly red stem; the above-water shoots are blue-green and strongly water-repellent, like those of the common parrot's feather it was long mistaken for.

Keeping

Easy and very fast: medium to strong light is enough, carbon dioxide is not needed, and it takes up nutrients quickly. Trimming is the whole of its care. It is far better known as a pond plant than as an aquarium one.

Placement

The middle or back of the tank, in a group, and in a garden pond in summer.

Propagation

By cuttings: any piece of stem carries on growing.

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: Myriophyllum rubricaule Topf

Scientific and other names, conservation status

Other scientific names: Myriophyllum cf. aquaticum 'Red Stem'
Myriophyllum rubricaule: Valk. & Duist.
Family: Haloragaceae
Range regions: Chile Central, Chile South

Red-stem Parrot's Feather

Tank conditions

Care and keeping