co2 system

[henward]

what is this?

you get expensive ones, and cheap ones in trade me for CO2 diffusers?

does this help plan growth?

is it needed?

[supasi]

Plants utilise the carbon from CO2 to grow, its essentially the same as a human requires protein to grow.

co2 is always present in water and plants use this, but for those who wish to really make their plants grow, co2 injection is used.

you can go the whole hog and have bottled co2 using regulator and solinoid. or be like me and do it the poor mans way and use a simple set up involving yeast fermentation to produce co2.

regardless of which option you choose some for of difuser is required to aid in absorbtion(dont know if that is correct term) of co2 into water or else most of co2 will just bubble to the surface and be lost.

ther are many ways to do this eg simple air stone works for small nano planted tanks, pumping bubble into a small powerhead also works well as the larger bubbles a smashed into tiny little bubbles with more surface area by the impellor, but IMHO i think the best way is to use either the glass type with ceramic disk(as available on trade me) or one of the many othe glass spiral,ladder types.

so in short,

CO2 injection(along with additional nutrients, adequet lighting) will make your plants grow , think of it the same as adding nice nutrient rich compost to your vege garden.

If you dont want to grow plants or you dont have adequet lighting then it may not be worth doing.

you can spend hundreds or spend under twenty dollars (like me ) and get great results, Each to their own..........

Anyone please feel free to correct me if im wrong as i am by NO means an expert

HTH

[Slightly Blue Dalmation]

yeah sounds pretty much on the money, natural is probably ok for a smaller tank, maybe bottle for bigger tank, it really is a tossup whether it is a worthwhile venture but it definitely helps plant growth

[jn]

Doesn't Caryl have a huge tank with no co2?

[alanmin4304]

It is a complete package. CO2 is absolutely useless unless you have adequate light and fertilizers. The light provides the energy for the plant to utilize the other stuff to build more plant. CO2 on its own just makes drinks fizzy. I use a very cheap and simple way to diffuse CO2 into my aquariums. I add fish.