CO2 in the spring

[Anonymous]

I want to get a CO2 system in the spring. I have a 20 gal tall with a bio wheel eco-complete and alot of plants. I also have 9 cherry barbs 9 neons and 3 hatchet fish. The plants are doing good and so are the fish. I do 10% water changes a week and add plant food. The water looks and smells good and the fish look healthy. The plants have a light brown algae and I was thinking the CO2 will get the plants going to get rid of that.

OR

Maybe you have another way to inprove my tank. Either way I welcome your coments.

Thanks
Teddy

 

[Anonymous]

Sounds to me like you don't need much improvement. Co2 will feed the algae as well as the plants. You might try reduced lighting. The algae will die off faster than the plants. Also reduced nutrients. To me the fish is all you should need. And of course you may need to harvest some unwanted algae/plant life from time to time.

But once the desirables are thriving and the system balances out, then very little actions are required to maintain that balance.

 

[Anonymous]

I will check and see how many watts I have but I would consider it a low light level. So maybe cut back on the plant food? The plant leaves die off and a couple new ones take there place I have not been pulling the dead stuff out, I have been wathcing it turn to a (skeliton) then disolve. Should I be doing that or does it matter. I was thinking it is adding the the substrait.

 

[Anonymous]

I will check and see how many watts I have but I would consider it a low light level. So maybe cut back on the plant food? The plant leaves die off and a couple new ones take there place I have not been pulling the dead stuff out, I have been wathcing it turn to a (skeliton) then disolve. Should I be doing that or does it matter. I was thinking it is adding the the substrait.

Hopefully it is just the dead leaves that turn into a skeliton not the entire plant. Yes plants do that. As long as new leaves replace the old and the overall plant is increasing in size that is normal. I do harvest some of the dead leaves just for looks though. But it doesn't seem to hurt anything If i just leave them in also.

I don't use any plant food in any of my tanks. Just the bioload provided by the fish.

Once I did have brownish water once in my current 10g. I switched from feeding twice per day to once per day and in two weeks the water was totally clear again. With noticable improvement in the first couple of days.

I also got some hair algae which I manually removed. Adding more plants basically stopped that.

You might look at this thread:
http://www.reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=60020

Cal and I had numerous problems with that tank. But all were solved by adding plants until the plant life was in control.

Just an idea.

 

[Anonymous]

The water is clear but the brown algae is on the back glass and some of the plants. and yes its just the leaves not the whole plant and there are new leaves all the time.

 

[Anonymous]

The water is clear but the brown algae is on the back glass and some of the plants. and yes its just the leaves not the whole plant and there are new leaves all the time.

Sounds to me like you are just slightly "out of balance". For instance, just not adding the plant fertilizer may be all that is needed for the brown to go away.

I do get a green hard algae over say about 6 months or so. All I do is scrape it off and I am good for another six months. That is a whole lot less effort than my first (non planted) tank. It required almost daily algae scraping and weekly filter cleaning also.

 

[Anonymous]

Well its only 2 months old so maybe I should just look at it more instead of messing with it.

Do you know if any of the sponsers here sell CO2 systems so I can start looking at them if that is what I decide to do later on?

 

[Anonymous]

Teddy:


Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh don't let anyone hear you saying that .

I don't use co2 systems so can't help. I understand you can even make a yeast powered system But that is not the way I run my tanks.

Hope you have the best tank ever.

Bob

 

[danmhippo]

Teddy, I highly suggest you visit plantedtank.net

Balanced nutrient, including CO2 will help boost plant's growth to outcompete algae. But lacking one or the other key ingredient would cause plants to "wait out until the condition is right", and at the absence of the complete nutritent, algae will take the opportunity and quickly multiply in your tank.

You should see that you have balanced nutrient of N (nitrate), P (Phosphate), K (potassium) and Fe (Iron) in addition to CO2 and proper light for your plants to benefit the addition of CO2.

One of the very good CO2 controller that I've heard about is Milwaukee. I am not using the CO2 bottles myself, but instead I am using Carbo-plus type of CO2 generator for my tank. You should look up the pro and con of these systems and see which one suits you best.

 

[gpodio]

Well its only 2 months old so maybe I should just look at it more instead of messing with it.

Brown algae is usually bacteria or diatoms, quite normal in a newly established tank. If the plants are doing well then I would wait and see what happens. Ottos and Nerite snails will help eat it up for you.

CO2 will help any planted tank, but along with it you must also change the fertilization regime you use. It's quite OK to have CO2 in a low light tank, it will give very nice results, but the increase in plant growth has to be supplemented with balanced levels of nutrients.

You should probably try DIY CO2 first to see how you like it, compressed is better but DIY will give you an idea without any investment.
http://www.gpodio.com/diy_co2.asp

Hope that helps
Giancarlo Podio

 

[Anonymous]

After doing some reading I need to test some things first. KH and PH. I will see what they are before posting the next 1,000 ?'s :lol:
Thank you
Teddy

 

[Anonymous]

FWIW I never test anything in my FW tanks. And my FO salt. Am almost there in my mixed reef also.