Diy Co2 , How To Turn It Off? Does It Hurt Fish/plants If Kept On At N

[anshuman]

Experienced Planted fishtank keepers with DIYCo2, please help.


I have 20 gallon killifish tank , its planted , medium, lots of broad hair grass, some cambomba coralina , water wisteria and some dwarf grass and marimo balls and LOTS of riccia floating.

I dose it with seach excel for co2 source and Dry-fert dosing.


Now i have just started DIY CO2 (as liquid co2 bottle is finishing), I know plants don't need co2 at night so how to turn this off? The bubbles are not fast btw, just one giant bubble per 4/5 seconds but the ceramic dispenser keeps spurting minute bubbles constantly in the tank.

Will it hurt fish if kept on?

Will it hurt plants if kept on?


Should i keep pulling the Ceramic/glass co2 dispenser to the surface every-night to avoid co2 spike at night?

I have this sponge filter which throws bubbles at surface and creates a current (which also disperses the co2 bubbles around water as it reaches surface). Will this help remove excess co2?

 

[vfg10]

hi
I had a problem with my DIY co2 because I did not turn it off I almost lost all my fish so now I just unscrew the cap of the bottle when I turn off the lights. I think you can do that to is very easy

the plants well be ok but the fish wont

hope I helped

 

[anshuman]

hi
I had a problem with my DIY co2 because I did not turn it off I almost lost all my fish so now I just unscrew the cap of the bottle when I turn off the lights. I think you can do that to is very easy

the plants well be ok but the fish wont

hope I helped

I feel so good that I read it now, and not in morning. Would had been horrible scene. Thanks.

 

[ian]

if theres enough surface agitation it doesn't really matter if its running at night, i run mine 24/7 and don't have gasping fishes.

 

[anshuman]

actually, there is no wild major agitation in this tank, it has just mild bubbles running on surface , enough to make small waves on surface and circle the water around mildly (the floating riccia island keeps rotating around the tank).

But it will be really messy for me to keep plugging the valve on and off every single day and night, so i was guessing is it safe.

I am now thinking, I can add a big limewood airstone and turn it on only at nights (to vapourize the excess co2 by agitation) and turn this airstone off in morning , that to me sounds more okay. humm.

 

[ian]

you can add an airstone, but it won't make much of a difference.

 

[anshuman]

airstone makes huge difference, those ppl who have airstone and then add DIY co2 or proper CO2 just dont see any improvement in plants because the CO2 never stays in tank with airstone running 24x7.

 

[ian]

what i mean is, it won't make a difference if you leave your diy c02 on.

 

[anshuman]

humm. the killifish, raised by me , fed them v costly and painstakingly raised bbs , In my sleep i will start seeing killies talking to me coughing as if they were choking on something, so i am putting that airstone for my sake i guess and i just did it too . Thanks for confirming me ianho.

 

[three-fingers]

Put the air pump on a timer and only run it when the lights are out.

Running it during the day would make the CO2 a total waste of time in the first place .

 

[Mikaila31]

DIY CO2 should be able to be run all night. You don't really add a lot of CO2 with the DIY method, unless you have like 2 liter bottles on a 10gal or something. Pressurized adds at least 2 times as much. I know some run pressurized 24hours without problems. I just seriously doubt the ability of DIY to reach the concentrations you need to suffocate fish. When I use to run DIY it ran 24/7.

 

[three-fingers]

^
That too.

Not something you should worry about, I always ran it 24/7.

 

[anshuman]

I know guys i really shouldn't worry about DIYCo2 to kill fish, but this killies were raised by me, v fragile 2 inch fishies, v costly for me to raise and it was PIA, don't want to loose this beauties.


so for the sake of mind, Airstone has been added , will run only at nights.


THANKS to everyone for replying me, made be feel assured on what I am doing.

 

[anshuman]

well. that was interesting.

Yesterday, i got lazy and at 8.pm i shut off the lights at killitank and didn't bother to put the oxygen airstone. Then i thought I see so many posts its harmless if its DIY Co2, lets find it out. I was watching marraige-ref and community back_to_back and then late at night , I suddenly realized need to check with tank, at 11.30 i found some females gather at top near riccia island. I didn't think much...then at 1.00 am, as i was bout to hit bed. I saw 3 Males and 4 female , hovering near the surface (NOT gasping but just hovering there), RED lights went in head, I panicked and threw in the air-stone. after 1 hour, I saw all killies have gone at the bottom as usual ,sleeping.


That was close, I am sure If i had forgotten , In morning I would have seen all fishes either dying or gasping as they were dying.


So yea, I think my DIY is potent enuf, I am not gonna test it again.

 

[Mikaila31]

That doesn't sound like a CO2 issue to me. half my fish normally sleep at the surface. The few killies I've kept are normally glued to the surface like typical killies. Them dropping to the bottom probably had more to do with the sudden surface movement then CO2.