Air Walls/curtains Or Air Stones?

[gogfumble]

I was looking at pumps on EBay to attach an air stone to as I would like some bubbles in my tank once I set it up. I found pumps that have 2/4 outlets so you can connect more than one air line and therefore attach an air stone to each line.

I then found references to air walls/curtains and went to see what these are and I really like the idea of having a curtain of bubbles across the back of my tank and I understand these will help with surface water movement.

Are there any benefits (other than the pretty bubbles) to either of these and are there any disadvantages?

Are there any fish that don't like bubbles/curtains and what about live plants?

Ta

 

[silky]

hii, it is okay to use the ones you saw, im usig a tetratec aps 100, this is very quiet, you can really hear it. all fish like bubbles as long as they can get away from them, instead of it blowing in their face 24/7 . they are good, they provide the aquarium with a higher amount of oxygen,i do recommend an airstone, they are simple to connect and you dont have to sit weighing your air curtain down.
this sure worked for me
hope this helps
regards
silky

 

[waterdrop]

Bubbles/airstones/air-curtains are an aesthetic choice. To the extent that they boil the water surface and cause surface movement, they can also enhance gas exchange between the water and air.

But its a misnomer that the bubbles themselves increase oxygenation - it turns out that the surface area between a bubble and the tank water is not there long enough for gaseous exchange to occur. A bubble rises too quickly for this.

So a tank that simply has surface disturbance via a filter output (spraybar, outlet jet, etc.) will be just as well oxygenated as one with an airstone.

Bubbles are a lot of fun and can look great in various kinds of tank layouts. I agree with Silky's statements that as long as fish have places to go -without- the bubbles bothering them then usually they like them and some fish will enjoy them quite a lot -- one of my favorite videos was one here one time showing a school of pygmy type cories playing like crazy in a bubble stream. Same common sense goes for plants too I'd say.

~~waterdrop~~