is there any kind of carbon supplement that you can add to the water column instead of messing with co2, so i don't have to worry about suffocating my fish? i am guessing no because i have never heard of it and besides, it would just be too easy that way
Seachem Excel is a non-CO2 carbon supplement. Apparently it is a good option for small tanks, like 20g and less, but gets expensive for bigger tanks. I've never used it though, yeast CO2 is cheap and easy once you get it going and figure out the head and tail of it.
How would you suffocate your fish? Adding CO2 doesn't affect O2 levels.
is there any kind of carbon supplement that you can add to the water column instead of messing with co2, so i don't have to worry about suffocating my fish? i am guessing no because i have never heard of it and besides, it would just be too easy that way
Don't worry about suffocating your fish. Extremely high levels of CO2 will harm them, but in a cheap Do It Yourself application, it is hard to get too much.
i guess i heard that if your diy co2 is bubbling at too high of a rate the co2 ppm could get too high and damage the fish. also since plants produce co2 at night, and fish produce co2 all the time, it seems like the combination could get too high esp at night. finally since you are not supposed to have an airstone going at the same time as co2, it seems like the oxygen levels would drop. maybe i have it all wrong, though, i don't really know. i guess it just seemed like a water column supplement would be safer since i have a lot of fish to worry about.
i have a 10 gallon and a 20 gallon tall right now, i'll be getting a 90 gallon in a while but it won't have high light plants in it so i prob won't do co2 there.
i guess i heard that if your diy co2 is bubbling at too high of a rate the co2 ppm could get too high and damage the fish. also since plants produce co2 at night, and fish produce co2 all the time, it seems like the combination could get too high esp at night. finally since you are not supposed to have an airstone going at the same time as co2, it seems like the oxygen levels would drop. maybe i have it all wrong, though, i don't really know. i guess it just seemed like a water column supplement would be safer since i have a lot of fish to worry about.
i have a 10 gallon and a 20 gallon tall right now, i'll be getting a 90 gallon in a while but it won't have high light plants in it so i prob won't do co2 there.
If CO2 is bubbling at too high of a rate, it is possible to get too much in the water, but there has to be some kind of mechanism of dissolving this CO2 in the water. Simply using an inverted bell, or a bubbler won't transmit enough CO2 to become harmful. Keep in mind that if you are using a yeast generator, you will be limited in how much CO2 you are able to produce.
At night plants stop taking in CO2 and the level does rise, but CO2 is also constantly escaping from the tank. If you are watching your pH levels, then you won't notice that they fluxuate more than about .2-.3 over a 24 hour period. This is a fairly small range and can EASILY be handled by fish and plants. If you turn the CO2 off at night, then the CO2 concentration can drop all the way down to equilibrium levels, and this can result in a pH difference of a point or more over a 24 hour period. This radical swing can be stressful, if not deadly to fish. Leaving the CO2 on is the best route. Using a bubbler at night will drive the CO2 out of the water even faster causing the pH to skyrocket even faster.
O2 levels do drop somewhat at night, but plants produce so much of it during the day that it is not dangerous to fish, unless seriously overstocked. One thing to keep in mind is that CO2 does NOT displace O2 in water. Water can be rich in both gasses at the same time.
It isn't hard to do, but you have to know what you are doing. I recommend some reading before you decide to take the plunge. Using a supplement solution may sound easier, but in reality it may prove more troublesome in the long run. This is just a theory though since I have never tried it.
i guess i heard that if your diy co2 is bubbling at too high of a rate the co2 ppm could get too high and damage the fish. also since plants produce co2 at night, and fish produce co2 all the time, it seems like the combination could get too high esp at night. finally since you are not supposed to have an airstone going at the same time as co2, it seems like the oxygen levels would drop. maybe i have it all wrong, though, i don't really know. i guess it just seemed like a water column supplement would be safer since i have a lot of fish to worry about.
You want the CO2 readily available the instant the light comes back on, and running an airstone at night might drive the pH up enough to emphasize large swings.
I don't recommend shutting CO2 off at night or running an airstone. Your fish aren't going to choke!
Agreed, the difference is small enough that it shouldn't matter much and adding the airstone only adds one more layer of complexity that isn't absolutely necessary. If your plants are growing well, they'll be producing more O2 than they or the fish can consume, even with lights off O2 shouldn't dip so far that the plants won't be pearling after a couple hours after lights on.
Back to the original question on the java moss - it is best grown over driftwood and won't readily take to your substrate-it always has to be artificially anchored and will continually try to grow up into the water rather than along the substrate.
It does catch everything imaginable, however, that can be used to advantage...if you have some flow in your tank, direct the flow into the java moss(or place the java moss in the flow, whatever works). This will force large pieces of plant material and general goop into the java moss, making it easily removed when you rip out the java moss. You can hide powerheads and ug filter heads, airstones, whatever else with a nice clump of moss.
But make no mistake, you will soon want to rip it out...it grows very fast and all over everything...but once introduced, it is nearly impossible to rid from a tank unless you remove everything and sterilize it. I rip handfulls out every week or so from my 55...
