Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I bought some duckweed on ebay, 12 days later still no show. Emailed the guy and he sent out some more which arrived in 2 days (pity they were only baby plants..now to wait till their mature to propigate). Today, 18 days after it was posted, a bag of dead slimy duckweed showed up, repackaged. The origional envelope had been opened in the corner but the plastic bag was not damaged in the slightest.

My theory is that they suspected it as drugs and intercepted it to check, sending it back on its way.

Anyone else had anything like this or am i just over imaginative (and watch too much border security )

Be interested to see how your duckweed goes. Can struggle to find it here, ebay may be the best solution. How much did you pay? and for how much?

I got mine from e-bay and it cost me about $5 including postage I seem to recall. I'd send u some of mine Stu, but it nearly all died because I took it out of the system (due to clogging issues) and put it in a small container subject to temp fluctuations (neglecting it when my main concern was my fish health).

I'd be suprised if you didn't have it in local water sources (creeks etc). Once you know what it looks like, you see it everywhere. When I get around to it I will grab some big adults from watersources around here. I remember GD saying ti is good to swap it out now and again as it can get no good over time if inbred.

All up i paid $4.50 for a small ziplock bag, all baby plants..so not sure how long until they are adults and propigating. That was the replacement bag. In the other bag which took a total of 18 days, there were about a dozen adult plants...pity they were all dead and starting to decompose

When my babies are propigating i would be happy to give you some


are their any tipes of duck weeds that are better than others? i have seen these fleshy ones that look like i guess chicken feet, the ones i have look like little round or slightly oval leaves.

oh and i have never seen any duckweed here in adelaide in natural waterways, so Monya if ya find a spot that does, id love to know about it.

Oh is there any risk of bringing in disease from wild havested duckweed?

Thanks guys.

I'm going to scout around garden centres as the weather warms up, see if I can't borrow some. I would guess it would be like bringing anything in from the wild, you take your chances.

Guys ...

Go to local pet shops, fish retailers and garden centres with ponds..

Keep your eyes open ...

For these people this is a weed!


U can get duckweed and azolla for free... if you offer to clean up for them!

my local fish shop (a large one) informed me that they didn't keep azolla or duckweed becasue, while not being illegal, the regular fisheries people frowned upon them keeping it.

I just got some on ebay for $3. Will see how long it takes to get here.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... 0016900708

Back to the original question: yes, probably a drug or maybe even a bit of paranoia after the liquid explosives thing?

My point was ...

Many garden centre ponds .. don't sell it .. they are stuck with it!

It hides around their water plants, irises and display lotus plants, and their water lilly ponds...

Look at the kiddie frog ponds.. in many of these places,,,

Offer to get rid of it for them ...

Do them a favour and you get it for free!

I have been to 4 garden centres this week and seen duckweed and azolla sticking to the side of pots of reeds, water lillys. ...

One handfull is all it takes to start a culture!

Azolla I got from a friends pond, duckweed I offered to clean up some waterbound and root bound pots for 10 mins at a local small garden centre...

I simply said, these look a bit bogged, , can I clean them up for you and repot.. can I have some of this awful weed?

I got three empty pots from them, I split the plant into three and repotted it in gravel that they provided..., scraped off weed and put it in a bag! Repriced the pots .

Easy!

Hi,

Don't be concerned about having baby duckweed......there's really no such thing for practical purposes. The stuff that splits off from the parent plant today will begin to multiiply within a day or two in the right conditions.

If your plants are very small 1 - 2mm across the leaves, you probably have a species called Wolffia. It's a native duckweed and it's as good as you'll get.

Get some light onto your plants, feed them just a trace of nutrients and keep the water temperature at around 24 degrees C and you'll be away.

cool, thats great to hear GD. And i was thinking i was going to have to wait a while for it to propigate. Havent toticed any substantial growth but i might chuck in some trace nutrients and see how it goes