A water feature can add beauty and a sense of tranquility to any landscape. Many attractive plants can be installed in large water-holding containers or in ponds with fountains, waterfalls and streams. Four plants available locally offer qualities that can enhance a water feature in a variety of ways. Information about these plants can help you plan a water feature that will be trouble-free and truly enjoyable.
A water feature can add beauty and a sense of tranquility to any landscape. Many attractive plants can be installed in large water-holding containers or in ponds with fountains, waterfalls and streams. Four plants available locally offer qualities that can enhance a water feature in a variety of ways. Information about these plants can help you plan a water feature that will be trouble-free and truly enjoyable.
Perhaps the most available and carefree plant to consider installing in either a pond or a container is the water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes). This plant floats on top of the water, has sturdy, dark green leaves that are round, standing up cup-like and producing a blue-violet flower spike in their center. The plant’s roots are a natural biological filter and can act as water cleansers in algae-laden ponds. The presence of water hyacinths can quickly clear cloudy pond water and remove impurities. This positive feature makes water hyacinth a desirable plant to include in any water garden.
A native to Brazil, the water hyacinth was probably introduced to Hawaii in the 1880s as an ornamental because of its beautiful orchid-like flower. The plants flower most often in warmer weather and in full sun locations. The cupped leaves alone add an interesting feature but the plant reproduces itself quickly and can soon cover your entire water feature. In small controlled areas, extra plants can be removed and composted or fed to livestock, but they should never be introduced into native waterways. A few plants can quickly clog large bodies of water, rivers and streams with thousands of their offspring.
Water lettuce, Pistia statiotes, is another floating water plant that can become a noxious weed in fresh water in Hawaii. The plant’s common name refers to its growth habit in a rosette pattern. Like the water hyacinth, it constantly reproduces itself by forming plantlets from the base of the rosette. The keiki remain attached for a while but break off as adults and start reproducing. The plant is in the Philadendron genus and the very large Araceae family, classified by its tiny, insignificant flower, which is in spadix and spathe form similar to its cousin the Spathipullum.
The thick, light green leaves of water lettuce are covered with tiny hairs that repel water and help keep them afloat. This plant grows well in partly shady water features where their size is smaller and they are not exposed to hot sun that can burn the leaves. The presence of water lettuce offers shade to a pond’s surface, which can prevent algae blooms and help maintain a cooler water temperature. The dangling roots of the plant also offer a good hiding place for small guppies or other fish that eat mosquito larvae.
Two other beautiful flowering plants are often considered for water gardens though they take a bit more care and attention. The plant family Nymphaeaceae was made famous by French painter Claude Monet’s 250 oil paintings of water lilies titled “Nympheas.” The family once contained both the water lily and the lotus. Today, the lotus has been reclassified into its own Nelumbonaceae family.
Both plants do best in a spacious pot of their own installed in a container or pond. Both grow and bloom best in locations that get six to eight hours of sunshine and have a temperature range between 60 and 90 degrees. Water lilies are definitely the easier of the two plants to cultivate, however.
In Hawaii, you’ll want to grow tropical water lilies. Most of the plants that are growing here originated in Thailand or other parts of Southeast Asia. Worldwide hybridizing and cross breeding have resulted in a wide range of colors from white to peach and pink as well as red, purple and even blue. Most of the flowers are fragrant, as well as beautiful. Though miniature varieties are available, the standards will work in most ponds or large containers.
The plants grow from tubers that are dormant for a few months every winter. In Hawaii, they do not usually die back but their growing rate slows. The plants put out rounded leaves that range from four to ten inches across with a notch where the stem connects the leaf to the plant. The flowers, which usually bloom in the summer months, are four to six inches wide and will last for two or three days. The buds rise above the water surface on three to six inch stems before opening.
Most tropical varieties only need repotting every three years and you’ll often find new tubers when you repot. These will allow you to start a new plant. Several online websites give written or YouTube instructions for starting new water lilies from tubers. Check them out and follow the instructions carefully to propagate successfully.
Most potted water plants need to be placed in pots without drainage holes so that the roots will not grow outside the pot. A slow-release fertilizer can be placed near the bottom of the pot so that it can offer fertility as the roots grow into the soil. The best soil to use in water plant pots is one containing a lot of clay that will hold nutrients well. Be sure to top the soil with pea gravel or rocks so that it does not float away or allow fish to uncover the plant. If insect or disease problems arise, be sure to look for pond friendly treatments that will not harm either plants or fish.
If you are up for a challenge and have visions of a water garden of sacred flowers, you may want to consider cultivating a member of the lotus family. They definitely require lots of care and attention at all stages of their growth. If you can find established plants, you’ll save yourself some effort but they can be costly. Prices for young plants usually start at around $60 and mature specimens can cost $150 or more. The cost relates to the difficulty of propagation and the care and feeding required for the plant to reach maturity. It takes a year or more from seed or dormant tuber for lotus plants to flower and lots of tender loving care is required in the interim for them to thrive.
The lotus plant is steeped in religious symbolism that differs among cultures. The symbolism is often defined by factors including the color of the flower, as well as its degree of openness. In Hinduism, lotus is associated with beauty. In Egypt, it is a symbol of the sun. In Buddhism, the plant symbolizes purity as it rises from a muddy base into a clean and beautiful flower. In the bud form, the flower represents someone who is closed and is just beginning a Buddhist spiritual journey. The opened flower symbolizes full enlightenment and is the reason Buddha is often portrayed sitting on an open lotus blossom.
Despite the care required to grow lotus, if you want large, showy flowers, leaves that can be more than a foot across, beautiful sacred buds and a lovely seed pod, planting a lotus may be worth the effort. Smaller varieties are available if you have limited space but they also require special care.
Lotus plants are available locally. Tubers, though available online, cannot be shipped to Hawaii. Seeds, however, can be shipped. They usually arrive with a tough outer shell that must be scarified in order to begin germination. Several instructional videos are available at youtube.com with information on acquiring, germinating and planting lotus seeds.
Though lotus plants require a large and spacious container to fully develop, most of the instructions for installing water lilies also apply to lotus plants. Lotus sprouts are very fragile and extreme care is required when planting or transplanting. The immature plants are also subject to rotting and the new leaves must be handled carefully to avoid disease. Lotus plants also require a lot of fertility. Special water plant fertilizers rich in nitrogen may be needed every few months unless you have a large fish population that can provide fertility.
Several area businesses carry water plants and can offer invaluable advice. Do your research to find out what is available and what can work for you before you venture into a water garden project. Check out the services available and gallery of photos at jasonswatergardens.com. Both Jason’s and Sunrise Nursery usually carry the plants mentioned here and can give you good growing advice. Many online sources also offer information on growing water plants. Checking with the experts before you plant will help you to truly enjoy the beauty and peace a water garden can offer.
Diana Duff is a local organic farmer as well as a plant advisor and consultant.