I know that most of the people on this forum feel that cattails are the Devil...I have always liked the look of them and most of the things that come along with them...
I have been trying for a year to get some rooted vegetation started with very little luck...Most of the banks are pretty true to a 3 to 1 slope with riprap over landscaping cloth going down in the water several feet...The hardy lilies I have started are in tubs and the iris is at the waters edge in one little corner... The lilies get no more then a couple of pads before the turtles or something snip the tubers... The iris is doing okay, but the water level has been up a little with the rain we have had so they are just kinda hanging and holding their own..
I am guessing I am going to have to remove most of the riprap and cut the landscaping cloth back to even give the cattails a chance... The goals are to try to get some of the nutrients out of the pond and get ahead of this planktonic algae I have been fighting since moving in...I have been doing my best to remove all floating mats of FA and limit the nutrients from entering the pond...My neighbors are using fertilizer on their yards, but they are using no P products...
I guess the major question is am I going about this the wrong way?.. What comes with cattails that I am not thinking about?.. Are they going to remove enough nutrients to be worth it?.. How deep do they really grow, have read in less than 18" of water?..Is this a better plant that for these goals that will be just a marginal rooted plant?
