Dwarf Ranalisma

Ranalisma rostrata

A tiny grass-like carpet plant that spreads by runners. Above water its leaves are round; submerged it turns into narrow blades and looks like another plant entirely.

Light: medium–high
Difficulty: medium
Temperature: 20 – 28 °C (68 – 82 °F)

Leaf colour: green
Plant type: rosette
Growth rate: fast
Tolerates light: medium – high
General hardness: 0 – 30 °dGH
Placement: foreground, carpet
Propagation: runners
Grows emersed: yes

Appearance

Underwater the leaves are narrow, bright green blades a few centimetres tall in small rosettes, joined by thin runners — close to the look of a dwarf chain sword.

Keeping

Moderate demands, all of them about the front of the tank: good light reaching the substrate, a nutritious base and carbon dioxide for a dense carpet. Growth is quick once it settles, and the runners close the gaps by themselves.

Placement

The front of the tank as a lawn. Plant small rosettes a couple of centimetres apart and let the runners work.

Propagation

By runners: young rosettes appear beside the parent and can be separated or simply left to spread.

Water conditions match

The water suits 1004 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 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: Ranalisma rostratum, Ranalisma rostratum in Vitro XL, Ranalisma Rostratum

Scientific and other names, conservation status

Other scientific names: Echinodorus ridleyi Steenis, Echinodorus rostratus (Stapf) Gagnepain (1929), not (Nuttall) Engelmann ex A. Gray (1848), Echinodorus ridleyi, Echinodorus rostratus
Family: Alismataceae

Dwarf Ranalisma

Tank conditions

Care and keeping