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Watermeal

Wolffia

Also called Water Meals, Watermeals

Watermeal
Photo: Christian Fischer, CC BY-SA 3.0

Watermeal is a genus of tiny free-floating aquatic plants, the smallest flowering plants on Earth, that look like specks of cornmeal on the water. They are grown mainly as a pond or aquarium plant and as a protein-rich food crop in some regions, and they need still or slow water with plenty of light.

Family
Araceae (Arum family)
Grows as
Aquatic
Light
Full sun, Bright indirect
Water
Grows floating on the water surface, so keep the pond or tank full and water quality stable.
Temperature
Roughly 18–30 °C for active growth; protect from freezing.
How easy
Easy
Safety
Not known to be toxic

About

Wolffia is a genus of aquatic plants with a cosmopolitan distribution. They include the smallest flowering plants on Earth. Commonly called watermeal or rootless duckweed, these aquatic plants resemble specks of cornmeal floating on the water. They often float together in pairs or form floating mats with related plants, such as Lemna and Spirodela species.

Other Wolffia plants

Spotless watermeal · Columbian watermeal

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Wolffia by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

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