Aloe-like Teloperez - Ornamental Perennial

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Aloe-like teloperez can most often be found in the temperate regions of Europe, in Western Siberia and in the North Caucasus. During flowering, this beautiful aquatic inhabitant rises to the surface. The aloe-like bovine grows mainly in ponds and lakes, but sometimes you can meet this handsome man in swamps. The dense, vast thickets of this amazing perennial will be a great decoration for almost any body of water

Getting to know the plant

Aloe-like teloperez represents the Vodokrasovye family. This aquatic plant is endowed with rosettes of numerous, harsh, broad-linear leaves. The tops of these leaves with prickly-needle edges, which are not difficult to cut against, playfully peek out of the water. And this herbaceous perennial got its name due to the fact that the rosettes of its leaves in appearance resemble aloe. The length of the leaves of the aloe-like teloresis often reaches half a meter.

Rosettes of leaves overwinter at the bottom of reservoirs, and by the middle of summer they have long roots that look like stilts. The flowers of the aloe-like telores, consisting of three petals, are similar to the three-petal flowers of the water color. As with other water-colored plants, the flowers of the aloe-like telores are formed by six segments - three outer cups-forming and three white inner ones. And due to the fact that this plant is dioecious, female and male flowers are found on various plants. It should be noted that the flowers of this aquatic beauty, reaching a diameter of four centimeters, are highly valued for their excellent decorative properties. This plant blooms from June to July.

The fruits of aloe-like telores are polysperms with rather fleshy pericarp.

On the surface of the water, the aloe-like bovine rises during flowering because it becomes lighter than water due to the carbon dioxide accumulating in its leaves and stalks. But in the sun, the plant "becomes a little heavier" and again sinks to the bottom due to the formation of fruits and an increase in starch reserves in it. Closer to autumn, the amount of carbon dioxide again increases in the leaves and stems, and the aloe-like telores again floats to the surface. And for the winter, it goes under water again as soon as it accumulates the required amount of starch.

It is believed that aloe-like teloresis is able to displace the growing filamentous algae, and also has wound healing properties.

How to grow

Both in partial shade and in the sun, the aloe-like telopere develops equally well. If you create favorable conditions for it, then it will grow well. It is noteworthy that sometimes during the season a single plant can reach up to sixty centimeters in diameter. Moreover, it will also suppress other types of vegetation. This wonderful perennial will delight with special decorativeness if it is grown in clean water with a lime content, and the reservoir should be in partial shade.

Large natural reservoirs will be an excellent solution for growing aloe-like telores. In small reservoirs, it develops poorly, especially if there is no soil at the bottom. Sometimes this plant is also grown in aquariums.

This aquatic inhabitant reproduces vegetatively, by daughter rosettes. Such rosettes grow from the axils of the leaves at the tips of the cord-like shoots. This usually happens in August. Reproduction of aloe-like telores and seeds is possible, but this requires both male (they are much more common) and female plants.

In order to plant this beautiful aquatic man, you just need to let him go into the reservoir. Since the aloe-like teloperez is very resistant to winter temperatures, ponds that do not completely freeze through at least 80 cm deep are perfect for it.

The aloe-like body cutter will not require special care, however, from time to time, extra rosettes should be removed, thus limiting the excessive spread of this aquatic inhabitant.