Reef nutrition

Mangroves

A_Lee

A_Lee

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I am thinking of trying and growing some mangroves on my desk. Does anyone have any experience of tips with these awesome looking plants? Does anything need to be supplemented? Iron, Magnesium?
I am contemplating a 1-1.5g tank, maybe with a little substrate to keep them rooted, and upright. No heater as there is no outlet available close enough to my desk.
I understand it is preferable to ween them from SW to FW -how long a period of time should this process be done over? I want to try and prevent them from losing all of their leaves. But if I can find mangroves already acclimated to FW, all the better for me.
I originally didn't plan on having any critters in the tank due to not having a heater in the tank. Is there any small animal that would do okay in some shallow water? I figure having a small critter in there would be nice in order to provide some nutrients for the mangroves. Sometimes it gets kind of cold in my room -but does anyone have any suggestions?
 
Hmm, in terms of acclimating them to fw, I have just set up a container outside and dripped freshwater into their current water, letting the container overflow. I don't know how ethical it would be, but I'm sure some hermit crabs would do just fine in the tank. Also, some of those Nass. obsoleta (I think?), anyways the black ones that don't fare well in our reefs could probably handle the lower temps. Do you know what the ambient temp is? Some of the cooler, but not cold water species might work out.

Except I just forgot that everything was going to end up being FW. Again, depending on the ambient temp, maybe a few tetras and a corycat, or some red cherry shrimp.
 
When you acclimated the mangroves to fresh water in the manner you just mentioned, were they being acclimated from full blown NSW levels? Also, did they end up losing any leaves?
The temperature is normally at no lower than 55-60F or so. Pretty chilly. I may just not use any critters, because there isn't going to be much water that will be in there. Thanks Mitch!
 
Yup, went from standard SW salinity to full blown FW. I'm sure they lost a few leaves, but it was a few years ago so I don't remember for sure.

Hmm, 55-60 is definitely on the chilly side for tanks. I know my apartment's ambient temp stays around 64 or so, and my gf's 3g fwp (I maintain it though, so just in name its hers) does just fine. It has a small cory and 2 tetras and it seems to do just fine.

Any special reason you want to do full FW and not a brackish tank? Anywhosit, even if it is full FW, ghost shrimp would probably do just fine I think :)
 
Good point Erin, I didn't think about that.
I plan to do weekly water changes FWIW. Hopefully this does something, haha! :D
 
Depends on what you mean by ambient light? Decent light from a window, or fair amount of office fluorescents should be OK I think?

Anthony- Erin hit the nail on the head. I knew something was bugging me about no critters. I'd definitely stick some sort of shrimp in there then at least, if not some snails too.
 
I have seen some mangroves being grown under office fluorescents; i don't think growth will be very quick though.
If the window doesn't work, I'll just use ambient light a 150w MH I have over one of my tanks :)
Maybe I can use just enough water in the tank, to cover the substrate? And just replace the water as it evaporates?
If I keep the water level higher, I can probably also look into using some ghost shrimp maybe?
Thanks for the great tips so far everyone!
 
Also, once you have them growing at full FW, you could look into some plants or mosses. Granted they'll compete for nutrients, but also do a good job competing with algae. You can do the full substrate, but I think it'd look cooler with the roots growing in water.
 
I did not have the same luck acclimating from SW to FW as mentioned previously. I lost some in the first few wks they got soft and started to shrivel. The others made it 5-6 months before they too started to shrivel up. As they were shriveling up they were putting out leaves then bang they were gone within one week. Absolutely zero root development during that time...
I had em in some coral sand so when the water would evaporate it was just like low tide then when I got motivated I'd just pop some more in there instant high tide.
And lighting was just from a window.
 
Hmm, it might make a difference that when I grew them next to a window, it was in San Diego and easily received a lot more light than up here.
 
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