Anubias 'Petite': the miniature nano epiphyte

The smallest anubias

'Petite' is a dwarf selection of Anubias barteri var. nana — itself already the small form of a West African aroid. It is reportedly a cultivated variety introduced to the trade in the mid-2000s and it has become the default miniature epiphyte for nano aquascaping. It is the same tough, slow, shade-loving plant as ordinary dwarf anubias, simply selected to stay tiny.

Everything, in miniature

Where dwarf anubias carries leaves a few centimetres long, 'Petite' keeps its deep-green, leathery leaves down to roughly one to two centimetres, on a correspondingly compact rhizome. Left to spread over a stone or a piece of wood it builds a dense, low mat of small leaves — the reason aquascapers reach for it where any larger anubias would look coarse. The leaves are hard and glossy, and like all anubias they resist being eaten by most fish.

Attach it and forget it

Like all anubias, 'Petite' is an epiphyte: it grows attached to wood and rock, not planted in the substrate, and the single most important rule is never to bury its rhizome (the thick horizontal 'stem' the roots and leaves grow from). Buried, the rhizome tends to rot. Tie or glue it to hardscape and let its roots take hold. It thrives in low to moderate light — in fact strong light mostly just invites algae on its slow leaves — needs no CO₂, and copes with almost any water hardness, feeding lightly from both the water column and its roots. It is genuinely one of the easiest plants you can keep.

Parameter	Value
Lighting	Low to moderate; tolerates shade well
CO2	Not needed
Temperature	22–28°C
pH	6.0–7.5
Hardness	Soft to hard — very adaptable
Fertiliser	Light water-column feeder
Substrate	None — attach to wood or rock; never bury the rhizome
Growth rate	Very slow
Placement	Foreground / attached to hardscape
Difficulty	Easy

The nano default

'Petite' is the anubias for small tanks and fine detail. Its tiny leaves suit the foreground and midground of nano layouts, the crevices of a rock face, or the tips of fine 'bonsai' wood where a full-size anubias would overwhelm the scale. It combines naturally with bucephalandra, mosses and the smaller java ferns in an epiphyte-led scape that needs no special substrate. Its slow growth means a layout built with it barely changes shape for months.

Divide the rhizome

Anubias does not make daughter plantlets the way ferns do; you propagate it by dividing the rhizome. Cut a mature rhizome into sections, each keeping at least three or four leaves and some roots, and attach each piece to new hardscape. Growth is very slow, so be patient. Given time and good conditions a healthy anubias will also flower underwater, pushing up a small aroid spathe — harmless, and often taken as a sign of a settled, mature plant.

Rhizome rot and spot algae

A rotting, mushy rhizome is the main way anubias is lost, and burying it is the usual trigger — keep the rhizome exposed on the hardscape. Physical damage and poor water conditions can also let rot set in, and it sometimes follows on from newly imported or tissue-cultured stock, so give new plants a clean, well-circulated spot. Green spot algae on the oldest leaves is common on such a slow grower and is largely cosmetic; it is usually associated with strong light on leaves that grow too slowly to outpace it, with low phosphate another commonly cited driver; other factors contribute too. Trim badly affected old leaves. Otherwise it is one of the hardest aquarium plants to kill.

More plants in this series

• Dwarf anubias — the standard-size parent
• Broadleaf anubias — the large-leaved cousin
• Bucephalandra — the other slow epiphyte jewel
• Java fern 'Windelov' — lace-tipped epiphyte fern