CO2

[Shakaya]

I have recently added a CO2 canister to my aqua one AR850 160 litre tank, as my fish were destroying their plants so I hoped this would help the plants grow faster. But my question is: Does increasing the carbon dioxide decrease the amount of oxygen available in the water? Should I also add an air stone? would this increase the oxygen level?

Please help me as I am new to this and are still learning, and are not sure I am doing everything right.

I have six plants which are still quite small so probaby not using a lot of CO2. My pH dropped intially when I stared to use the CO2 unit but has now stabilzed at 6.8. The Iron test is 0.5, General Hardness is 40, and the Carbon dixoide is 10.

Please do not confuse me to much.

Thank you for your time and help.

[MicB]

hi,

I to have an AR850 tank with plants in it.

What is the CO2 system you are using?

I have tried DIY CO2, Hagen system, Flourish and Sopda stream and now Sera Tablets.

The DIY Co2 was a pain it never lasted much more than a week and the flow was irregular. The hagen system was the same but just a smaller unit. It was better insulated. I used flourish for a while the plants grew slowly but did grow. No mess system. They were not bright green like CO2 tanks tho. I tried CO2 I stuck a wedge in the soda stream button and had a nice slow flow of gas it worked Ok till the temp dropped over night and I had gas rushing into the tank. All my fish were doing Kayak rolls in the top, stund mullets. I put a air stone in after 15 minutes the guppies came around and after 45 minutes the bottoms feeders got up and moved around. I used the Hagen ladder to diffuse the bubbles into the water.

The plants were noticeably better with CO2 even after 5 days. After the second failure of dupping Co2 into the tank early in the morning I took it out. I have been using the CO2 Tablets from Sera. I experiment with them in a coke bottle weighted in the tank. The gas was gone in 2 Hours. But the plants look bright green I think its more the sediment left by the pill that helps the plants. I got a proper Sera CO2 holder and the gas lasts for about 6 hours now. No idea why its longer in it. It cost about the same as the Flourish excell but better results. I use 1 pill ever 2nd day so for $13 i get 40 days Co2 $.33 per day. This equals the monthly hire for a CO2 Bottle from BOC. I used a CO2 indicator for the Soda stream system and yes you can get the correct amount of gas in the tank even with the trickle flow of the filter removing a lot of the gas out.I was going to weigh the soda stream bottle to find the flow rate and how long a bottle would last but the temp swing forced me to stop the test during winter.

A regulator is the obivious fix for this problem.

They recommend 15ppm of CO2 for plants.

I hope some of my errors and findings help you.

Cheers

[Shilo]

Shakaya,

Increasing C02 will not decrease the amount of Oxygen in the water. If you super saturate the water with C02 you can still dissolve the same amount of oxygen and visa versa.

Forget the air stone. This will disrupt the water surface allowing the C02 to disolve out of the water. If your O level is ok for your fish before C02 then it will still be ok afterwards.

Balance is the answer. Try to increase C02, Light and fertilisers at the same rate as plant the plant growth. Take things slowly with no sudden changes to one or the other.

Handy calculator for CO2 http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua/art_plant_co2chart.htm

Hope this helps.

[Shakaya]

Thank you so much for your help.

The CO2 unit I am using are 2 of the DIY Hagen Nutrafin Plant System.

I will forget about the air stone and contiue doing what I am doing.

Thanks for the link to that website it was very interesting.

Cheers again

[Dave363]

hope you are gaining with the Co2, I run the co2 through a solenoid valve that I have connected to the timer for the lights. open when the lights come on. I have it on all day say 7.00am to 6.00pm when the lights switch off, ( valve closed ) the air pump is timed to come on and stays on all night.

The water is Co2 saturated all day, the plants and fish thrive, its a major pruning the plants it has to be done every 3 weeks or so or they block out the light.

Hope this helps.