Co2 At Substrate Level

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I have a 200ltre tank and started dosing Co2 about 6 weeks ago, I regulated the bubble checker to 50 per minute and the drop checker turned from blue to green, great I thought but then I noticed the leaves at the bottom of the plants were brownish whilst the upper were nice and green.
My set up consists of a diffuser with a Hydor Koralia Evolution Circulation Pump directly above it at the water surface.
So I had this idea of lowering the circulation pump so that it was just above the diffuser at the bottom of the tank.Within a day the fish were at the surface inc the plecs I looked at the drop checker it was still green.
My first reaction was to reduce the Co2 down to 20 per minute but then I realised that I had removed the aggitation away from the water surface which is what I believe caused the Co2 to spike. I know drop checkers can take a few hours to react but even at 20 bubbles per minute it remains green.
How is it possible to get Co2 to the plants at substrate level like HC Cuba? :hyper:
I would be grateful for any comments as I beginning to think that Co2 is a waste of money.
 
CO2 should be reaching the bottom parts of the aquarium via diffusion across a concentration gradient anyway, but you can improve things by adding a circulation pump.
 
You could have it anywhere, you just need good circulation, are your plants showing any deficiencies?
 
Also, the incident of the fish being at the surface was probably not to do with a CO2 spike, but if you had removed the surface agitation then it was more likely due to a drop in oxygen dissolved in the water. Generally you want your filter outlet blowing the CO2 bubbles arouund just as they're about to reach the surface (so you're still getting surface agitation). Try moving your drop checker about the tank to different places and leaving it for a few hours in each place. This will show you how the CO2 is being distributed about the tank and if there's any spots where you need to increase flow. However the fact that the tops of the HC is green makes me lean towards the lighting idea. If it wasn't getting CO2 then probably none of it would be a nice green colour and wouldn't be growing.
 
Cheers guys, I only just realised that the plant is actually Hemianthus micranthemoides the HC has mostly dissapeared my fish think its a delicacy. :rolleyes:
 
Hahaha, luckily we have a tank with silver dollars in with no plants that I can put any bad munchers in if I catch them :p I've also found silver dollars to be very good at getting rid of plant trimmings... Quite handy :lol:
 

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