Floating Crystalwort

Riccia fluitans

A rootless liverwort that grows as a tangle of forking green threads. Traditionally kept floating, it became an aquascaping staple once aquarists learned to tie it down and grow it as a bright, bubbling underwater cushion.

Light: medium
Difficulty: medium
Height: 3 – 5 cm (1.2 – 2 in)
Temperature: 4 – 30 °C (39 – 86 °F)

Leaf colour: green
Plant type: free-floating
Growth rate: fast
CO₂ demand: medium
Tolerates light: medium – high
pH: 5 – 7
Carbonate hardness: 0 – 21 °dKH
General hardness: 0 – 30 °dGH
Placement: spawning plant, nano tank +1 spawning plant, nano tank, surface
Propagation: fragmentation, division +1 fragmentation, division, daughter plants
Grows emersed: yes

Appearance

Flattened, repeatedly forking branches build mats 3 to 5 cm thick and a vivid light green. There are no roots and no stem: every fragment is a whole plant.

Keeping

Kept under water it needs good light and added carbon dioxide, and rewards both by trapping oxygen bubbles on the tips. Growth is fast, and the mat has to be trimmed: new shoots always turn upwards, and an untended cushion tears loose and floats away.

Placement

Tied to stone or mesh it makes a low green cushion; left floating it forms a dense surface mat that is a classic shelter for fry and a spawning site for bubble-nest builders.

Propagation

It falls apart by itself — every piece keeps growing. Divide a mat by hand and tie the pieces down.

Water conditions match

The water suits 861 of 1249 species in the catalogue — these are the ones people look up most often.

Butterflyfish Julii Corydoras Featherfin Synodontis Red-finned Parotocinclus Gastromyzon monticola Egg-shaped Goldfish Flame Tetra Gardner's Killifish African Tetra Hypsolebias picturatus Common Zacco Labeo Bicolor Gambusia Flying barb Gastromyzon scitulus Albino Zebra Danio Geophagus Brokopondo Homaloptera bilineata Red-tailed Rasbora Boraras naevus Lampeye Killifish Spotted Raphael Catfish Corydoras melanotaenia Festivum cichlid

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 Moonlight Gourami Melanotaenia parva

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: Riccia fluitans Broad

Scientific and other names, conservation status

Other scientific names: Fysonia tenera, Marsilea terrestris, Riccardia dichotoma, Riccia canaliculata fluitans, Riccia centrifuga, Riccia eudichotoma fluitans, Riccia fluitans aquatica, Riccia fluitans gracilis, Riccia fluitans lata, Riccia fluitans limicola, Riccia fluitans minor, Riccia fluitans terrestris, Riccia fluitans nana, Riccia fluitans pallida, Riccia fluitans viridescens, Riccia media, Ricciella fluitans, Ricciella fluitans robusta, Ricciella fluitans terrestris, Ricciella fluitans birmensis, Ricciella fluitans hydrophila, Ricciella minor
Riccia fluitans: L.
Family: Ricciaceae

Floating Crystalwort

Tank conditions

Care and keeping