# Wisteria is not-so wisteria-looking anymore



## Kaffrin (Apr 1, 2014)

Initially when I bought my bunch of wisteria it looked something like this:








After a couple of months it looks like this:








It's no longer branching out into those thin leaves and has very large leaves. Not that it looks ugly or anything, but I just want to know what's causing the change? 

So I've basically got one 23watt 6500k bulbs from home depot on the 10g. I've read that increasing light should help- I did that! Ended up getting hair algae attack, lol. Extra light has been removed.

The tank is dirt-ed, removed filter. Stock is... who-knows-how-many MTS, 1F betta, 2 ghost shrimp. Recently did h2o2 treatment to kill algae.

PH 7.4-7.6
Nitrates/'ites 0
Ammonia .25 forever ;c

Hopefully this info helps give an idea >.< and can get me some answers~ Thank you in advance!


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## tankman12 (Nov 13, 2012)

In my 29g (4 wpg, co2, good substrate, ferts) it looks like the 1st pic. Then i trimmed some and put some in my 5g (1.5 wpg, no co2, just sand, sometimes gets ferts) and it looks like yours. Idk y it changes like that. 

P.s. flourish excel=no hair algae
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## Kaffrin (Apr 1, 2014)

I do have some crypts/anacharis/wort-y plants in there :/ I hear that they tend to die with excel. Oh! I also have no Co2 on the tank!


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## tankman12 (Nov 13, 2012)

I have amazon swords, rotala indica, bacopa, chain swords, christmas tree moss, java ferns, anubis, water sprite, water wisteria, anacharis, crypts, aponogeton ulvaceus, dwarf lily, cardamine lyrata, ludwigia repens, crinum calamistratum, scarlet temple, dwarf hair grass, ammannia gracilis, marimo moss ball, glosso carpet, and a lace plant. Not 1 thing melted and i even have overdosed a couple of times 2 kill the algae and nothing happened.
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## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

Try pinching the Wisteria and see if that helps. I have had plants melt from regular Excel so I dose at half-strength; strangely enough it wasn't the Crypts but the Tiger Lotus and Dwarf Water Lily. Not even sure if I'm going to continue using it. But Tankman is right: Excel = no hair algae in my tank, too.

Are you using fertilizers?


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## tankman12 (Nov 13, 2012)

Ya the tiger lotus would probably melt. My dwarf lily didnt. But those plants over react 2 different things. They r very "different" plants. But if u r nervous about it, do what russell does and do a half dose.
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## Kaffrin (Apr 1, 2014)

I haven't used any ferts for about 2 weeks. Started again today with about 1ml of Flourish. I did plan on stabbing 3 osmocote+ tabs into the substrate, but am not sure if that would cause some sort of major algae outbreak :x so I didn't. Is there a particular place I should pinch the wisteria? Thanks!


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## RussellTheShihTzu (Mar 19, 2013)

I would still use the plant tabs as root feeders are just that. Pinch the Wisteria where the leaves join the stem. Pinching stops lateral growth at that point and forces branching.


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## tankman12 (Nov 13, 2012)

RussellTheShihTzu said:


> I would still use the plant tabs as root feeders are just that. Pinch the Wisteria where the leaves join the stem. Pinching stops lateral growth at that point and forces branching.


Maybe not. What is ur substrate? It looks like fluval stratum.
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## kittenfish (Dec 1, 2013)

Not really relevant in a betta tank, but cooler temperatures can also cause it to grow these unbrached leaves.


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## Tony2632 (Aug 30, 2013)

*My wisteria also grew leaves like this, but only growing out of the water. i feel like experimenting with this plant. I can get loads of this plant out of my 10g. 
*


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## Kaffrin (Apr 1, 2014)

Oh, cooler temperatures -might- be it(At night). When it started to hit the 90's I took out the heaters in most of my tanks. But throughout the day it's usually a baking 82-84. I feel like that's still too warm to cause the leaves to go all funky. Additionally, waking up to a planaria explosion was not on my to-do lists. Plus, one of the shrimps has gone opaque in certain areas. Preparing a shrimp burial. The only thing I've done is add a little less than 1ml of Flourish. The water is pretty cloudy, so I've added a filter to it in hopes of giving some aid to the mess. No way I overdosed on the flourish... Less than 1ml for 10g is normal, pretty sure.
Tony, some tests would be pretty interesting to see!


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## DaytonBetta (Feb 4, 2014)

I dose every other day with Excel. I have Anacharis and Cryptocoryne. They are fine. My wisteria and java ferns have done so well and the algae control is great.


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## Agent13 (Apr 23, 2013)

Root tabs help the leaves lace out that way .. They love iron ! along with warmer water mid 70s to low 80s. Co2 does make them happy and like the first pic .. I have one that's on co2 and 3 that aren't .. I can see a little difference . However the non co2 tanks with wisteria they still lace out like your plant did originally mostly . I still put root tabs on the other tanks and recent aquavitro envy again. 

Another thing to note is they don't like super soft water nor do they like really hard water .


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## cindygao0217 (Jul 3, 2014)

Root lab help a lot with my plant try it


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## Kaffrin (Apr 1, 2014)

Ooh, this is very interesting info ^.^ My water is pretty hard last I checked. I wonder if that's causing it to go all flat as well! Yesterday I added root tabs- 3 to each thickly planted area. Still a bummer since my shrimp died after starting ferts again. Even though they looked kind of.. scary- they were still dear to me!

I pinched the tips off- now we just have to wait and see the growth~


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## Freedom (May 17, 2009)

Wisteria reacts to light.

In weak light, it grows broad leaves. In high light, it grows thin almost fern like leaves. It looks like a completely different plant, depending on the light. 

Once the leaves have developed, changing the light will not change those leaves, just the new growth. The 'old' leaves may change very s l o w l y but you will see the change in the new growth first.


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## Agent13 (Apr 23, 2013)

Are you really sure about that ? One of the three tanks I have wisteria in does have weak lighting and then you add the depth of the tank and even the little one I just planted laced out very nicely .. And no different from my other two tanks with the same plant which are run on much higher light . 


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## Freedom (May 17, 2009)

Agent13 said:


> Are you really sure about that ? One of the three tanks I have wisteria in does have weak lighting and then you add the depth of the tank and even the little one I just planted laced out very nicely .. And no different from my other two tanks with the same plant which are run on much higher light .
> 
> 
> Sent from Petguide.com App


Yep, I'm sure. 

Use Google and put in:
aquarium wistera light leaves

Lots of hits, and they all explain it as I did.

Not seeing a photo, is it possible you have water sprite not water wisteria? The leaves look the same. Wisteria is a stem plant; sprite grows more like a bush, with the leaves unfurling from a central area. 

Just pondering what the difference may be.


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## Agent13 (Apr 23, 2013)

I have both plants( and 50million others too 😉) I know the difference . I don't EXACTLY doubt you're info if you're taking from personal experience just wondering why mine did differently if that's true .. I don't do google ... When I've seen people post on here about something they are doing wrong in fish care I often google just to see what they may have seen to know if that's why they made the mistakes ... Quite often google was exactly why they were doing something wrong . Even Wikipedia is often incorrect or slightly wrong as anyone can edit it ... Anyone lol(don't ask me how I know this lol). I like books from scientific accredited sources (however I don't have one on plants.. Just fish ones ) . Perhaps I should grab one on plants now seeing as I'm about to dump enough money to make me cry planting my 225 ...

Just thinking here .. I wonder if with water that's more alkaline then they prefer (but not enough to kill it ) or even too acidic that then lighting becomes the more important factor in their wAy of growth ?? Just making educated guesses here . I have pretty neutral water in all my tanks aside from one .

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## Freedom (May 17, 2009)

You sound like me - a million plants ha haaa. 

I was told that by the members of my local Tropical Fish Society, when I was bidding on the wisteria at the auction. (End of meeting, folks have donated plants, helps the group raise funds, as a guest I could not vote in the meeting, I could bid at the auction). Then when I came home I checked as I wasn't sure if it was the high light broad leaves, or low light broad leaves, lol. 

Only had wisteria in my tank about 3 weeks. 

Water parameters could be a factor, as you said.


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## Lefitte (Oct 2, 2013)

Interesting. I'm wondering about the cause too because I've seen three different leaf growths on the same wisteria plants. I found that when they are grown above water they grow really broad leaves that have teeny ridges and are sort of rough to the touch. That was how they were when I got them from PetSmart. From there, they grew into the leaves in the second picture, sort of a middle ground, and finally they started growing the normal fernlike leaves. All the original leaves have since died out on those plants and now I'm only left with the other two. The fernlike leaves are closer to the light but that's because they are the newest. In the time I've had them, the water parameters have been changing [cycling] so that could be it as well.


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## tankman12 (Nov 13, 2012)

It could be a nutrients deficiency. Because I have this in me high light tank and it look perfect. I also have it in my 16 bow low light with floramax and flourite black sand and it looks like the first pic. But in my 5 gallon low light tank with just black sand.
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## Kaffrin (Apr 1, 2014)

This plant seems to have a personality! I pinched it a bit and let it grow.









My cycle recently died due to my silly actions and it suddenly starts growing properly in some bits that I didn't pinch. Pretty sure that had no actual effect on it. Now just to get the other bits to start looking pinnate.


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