Sometimes there are too many complicated terms in gardening. Today we talk about macrophytic plants. Despite this name that sounds too technical, you can tell that it refers to something simple. Roughly speaking, a macrophyte plant is one that can be seen with the naked eye and that can live in lands flooded with water throughout its life or withstand long periods of flooding.
Do you want to know more about macrophytes? Keep reading 🙂
Macrophyte plant characteristics
These plants are also known as marsh plants. Among some species of macrophytes we find the reeds, esparganios, eneas and reeds. For people specialized in the ornamental plants sector, they call macrophytes as those aquatic plants that can be used for the ornamentation of ponds, gardens and small artificial lagoons.
We find various types of macrophyte plants. The emergent ones are perennial plants whose reproductive organs are aerial. They usually live in flooded places temporarily or permanently. These plants can live perfectly in the marshes of a river.
There are also floating macrophytes that live in lakes and ponds.
Advantages and disadvantages
The use of these plants as ornamentation can have certain advantages or disadvantages. They are perfect invasive plants in places where they are implanted since they have a great capacity to adapt to swampy lands. In addition, they can become a support when transmitting diseases and pests to other plants.
When in an environment exists lack of oxygen these plants take advantage of to proliferate.
Among the benefits obtained from these plants we find the usefulness they have for fish and aquatic environments, they are perfect as organic fertilizers, They are used for the production of biogas and for the generation of cellulose.
As you can see, these plants have several advantages that make them be used for ornamentation and other aspects.