Help with a couple CO2 questions?

[Dougie]

hi,

i have a couple of questions regarding my co2. I am starting to ramp it up and getting it done properly as for the past 3-4 months i have been manually turning my regulator on in the morning and off at night which is a pain trying to get it to settle before i leave for work!

I'm using CO2 Art equipment, regulator and sodastream bottle adapter. I have been using a fluval ceramic disk and bubble counter and have been using 1bps and have been advised it should be higher? How much higher? I have a 125l tank?

Today i have upgraded and purchased a solenoid so i don't need to manually turn on and off every day! and an inline atomiser to get rid of the unsightly wire inside my tank anything else you would recommend equipment wise or am i good to go?

I hope this inline atomiser will increase the amount of co2 in the water. I have never (I don't think) witnessed my plants pearling? I take it this will be through lack of CO2?

Thanks in advance for any help you can give

 

[Claire]

If you have a drop checker, then that will give you a rough idea of where your co2 is at. Lime green is about right, with yellow being too much and blue too little. They aren't always the most accurate though and take a couple of hours to change along with co2, so a better way of measuring how much co2 is in your water at any given time is by measuring your ph.

Your co2 should come on about 2 hours before your lights come on and go off about 2 hours before your lights turn off. This is so that the co2 has time to build up in the tank before the lights come on and the plants start trying to photosynthesise.

In testing your ph, you should be able to get your ph to drop by 0.8-1 from before your co2 comes on till the time that your lights come on. This is due to co2 being acidic. This drop is universal for all different water sources as it is measuring against your own initial water ph. If the difference is less than about 1 by lights on, there is not enough co2 in the water. This may be because your bubble rate is too low or your diffusion method is not good enough. I would say you could have more than 1 bubble per second, but each setup varies dependant on the efficiency of the system. Some people get away with 1-3 bubbles per second, whereas others you can't count the bubble rate! You would then test the ph every hour or two throughout the time of your lights being on to see if it changes at all once the plants start photosynthesising and using it, which is called making a ph profile.

Try with the drop checker first, trying to get it that lime-green by lights on. Watch the fish too. If they start sitting up at the surface then it suggests too much co2, but if they're ok then you can push a little further. Once you are getting lime-green at lights on or somewhere near, you can try the ph testing to see how you're really getting on.

 

[Dougie]

Thank you for your answer!

I have a drop checker and it is usually a dull green at lights on, so i obv have to little co2!

I'll start testing Ph though, and see where i get.

 

[Claire]

It's just a bit more of an exact science with ph testing. You don't need to do it straight away, I would concentrate on your drop checker for now and if you're still getting problems when the drop checker is good (i.e. algae issues or poor growth) then you can try the ph profile to really see what's going on.

 

[Dougie]

Growth seems pretty good, although i have a problem with keeping my moss bright green and not dirty? Java moss i think. And i have 2 300l/ph powerheads at opposite ends of the tank for circulation.

Do you think shrimp would be good for this?

 

[Claire]

Shrimp are good for keeping mosses clean yeah. Amano shrimp are one of the most popular types as they are large enough not to be eaten by most things. The other option is cherry shrimp, which are smaller, but will breed in freshwater (amano shrimp won't).

The other thing would be to put both your powerheads side by side along with your filter output so that they are combining for flow. Having them at opposite ends of the tank reduces their efficiency as they are competing against each other. A little extra flow over the moss may help keep any crud out of it

 

[Dougie]

Ahh i never thought of that! So for example my filter output is on coming into the top left of my tank directioned to the right front corner. So the best bet would be to put the two powerheads on the left side of the tank?

Good idea, never even crossed my mind.

And i know where i can pick up some amano shrimp! how many do you recommend for my 125l?

 

[Claire]

Yeah, then everything is working together to get good flow.

I guess 5 would be a good start, not really sure if there's some sort of rule for the best number! I had 10 in my 180l, but now I only have 4 due to old age. I've had them about 4 years and they've been through several rescapes! Just make sure not to dose anything with copper as it will kill invertebrates like them and snails.

 

[Dougie]

Yeah, then everything is working together to get good flow.

I guess 5 would be a good start, not really sure if there's some sort of rule for the best number! I had 10 in my 180l, but now I only have 4 due to old age. I've had them about 4 years and they've been through several rescapes! Just make sure not to dose anything with copper as it will kill invertebrates like them and snails.

Nice, i checked with my LFS and he only has Cherry's or Rili? (I think). Would these be ok, only thing in the tank that could possible bother them would be my cory's.

 

[Claire]

Cherrys are probably your best bet - pretty easy to keep as long as you don't have anything big enough to munch them.

 

[Dougie]

Cherrys are probably your best bet - pretty easy to keep as long as you don't have anything big enough to munch them.

Hi Claire, I can't thank you enough! Ever since moving my flow to one side of the tank my moss has exploded in life in only a few days! It's went a nice bright green and I bright on the ends of the moss! It looks 1 million times better!☺ thank you so much.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

[Claire]

Glad to hear it That's what we're here for!