water lettuce questions

[KLKelly]

Really long story short: I'm debating cycling my trickle tower bins of water that I use for water changes.  My well water is really frustrating.  I am thinking of adding lighting and a lot of plants to help with the nitrate levels.  Water hyacinth and water lettuce were recommended.

Questions: 
1.  I use cold water (avoiding the hot water heater) to refill the basement bins.  Would water lettuce be able to handle going from 75 degree water to cold water once a week (until the water heats up again)?
2.  What place would be best to look for this?  I see in old posts Ritchies was mentioned.

Thanks 

Karrie

[PaleoFishGirl]

How cold is 'cold'? I would think that water lettuce would be able to handle the shock, it's pretty hardy.

Ritchie's is a good place for it, but you can find it at any RONA or Home Depot this time of year in the garden centres.  A lot of LFS carry it right now too but it's typically more pricy.

[KLKelly]

Cold is really cold - might have to use the hot water tank but I'd rather not.

Thanks for the heads up on Rona and Home depot.  I'll check them out!!!

[sas]

Alot of the better garden nurseries have water lettuce and other pond plants this time of year but they are pricey as PFG said. I bought lettuce and hyacinths at our local Loeb grocery store just 2 weeks ago. They had them in a trough of water.They were asking 4.99 a plant. hth

[Nerine]

it needs a lot of light....but very hardy and reproduces very quickly!!
you'll enjoy them

I'm going to MTL in a couple weeks...I can see if I can bring some back from the pond for you if you want? no promises though...depending on how quickly you need it

[KLKelly]

I'd love it if you could bring some back from the pond.  Let me know the cost as well.

Regarding the lighting - I have the bins in the basement which is fairly dark.  I was thinking since its in the basement I don't care what it looks like.  I have one of them spider arm lamps from home depot that could hold five bulbs. 

The top bin where I would be putting the water lettuce is about 35 gallons.  So would 5 13W curly bubls (1.86wpg) or 5 27w curly bulbs (3.86wpg) but the light wouldn't be directed via a canopy so a lot would be lost.  I just don't want an algae factory.  Advice?

[BigDaddy]

Water lettuce is a very high light plant.  It is a floating plant which normally gets direct sunlight.  Noon day sunlight translates into approximately 10,000 foot candles (a foot candle is one lumen per square foot).  Needless to say, its a ton of light, so having a weak light source several feet away from the water lettuce probably won't do the trick.

If you go to most LFS, you'll see they keep their water lettuce directly under a metal halide pendant...

[KLKelly]

good to know.  I don't think I'll be keeping water lettuce 

[kennyman]

Hornwort is low light, cheep and a good nutrient export too. You should be able to find it here, at any pond plant place or the rideau river even