Wednesday Vignette

My Wednesday Vignette this week is a shot of water hyacinths finally flowering in the stream. I bought ten of them earlier this spring, around the time I started the stream up again, in hopes that they would help keep it clear of string algae. And it worked. Although normally water hyacinths are floaters, I don't have a pond where they can float, so I embedded the roots in the rocks that line the bed of the stream, so they remain stationary. They have multiplied like mad, but didn't start to bloom until just a couple of weeks ago.

Water hyacinth

I'll have to remove them before we get our first frost, as they aren't perennial and will turn to mush if they freeze. They've done such a great job keeping the stream free of algae, I don't mind that I'll need to buy them every year. I wish I had realized years ago that they would work so well at consuming whatever nutrients were feeding the algae and causing it to thrive.

Anna at Flutter & Hum hosts Wednesday Vignette. Check out her post here.