Inexpensive way to boost CO2?

[Byron]

I do use Flourish comprehensive, I did get a bottle of Flourish Iron as well. I was thinking that it would be smart to add a little tap water to each water change to boost the GH/KH. I have been hesitant to add more iron because I do not have a way to measure Iron levels yet.

If you use a reliable comprehensive (complete) fertilizer, you should not add additional iron. This is likely to harm the plants and fish. The 17 nutrients plant require need to be proportional to each other. Excesses of some nutrients can cause plants to shut down assimilation of other nutrients. When you are dealing with a fish tank that happens to have plants, the fish must be the priority. This does not mean you cannot add plant additives, but what you add must be minimal.

Going back to the fish you have listed...these are soft water species. With one exception, the knight goby. This species actually does better in slightly alkaline conditions and with sea salt as in a semi-brackish set-up. However, the other soft water species will be harmed by any sea salt, so you have a problem. The goby should not be in with the other fish. There are other very serious issues here too, with the loaches especially. If I get into that this thread will really get involved, so I will leave it and stay with plant nutrition.

You could mix in some source water, to reach say 4 dGH. The soft water fish should have no issues with this. I actually did something similar for a few years, using Seachem's Equilibrium to maintain a GH of 4-5 dGH. After a discussion with a couple of marine biologists, I stopped the Equilbirum, and went to the Flourish Tabs plus Flourish Comprehensive, and the two provided the necessary calcium for my plants without harming the fish.

RO water is fine for the soft water species (not the goby), and plants will be OK as well with a comprehensive fertilizer. Seachem's Flourish Tabs will work for the swords, and their Flourish Comprehensive Supplement for the Planted Aquarium will work for all of the plants. I have basically RO water coming out of my tap, GH and KH are zero with a quite acidic pH, and my plants thrive using the two afore-mentioned products. I've been doing this for over a decade now.

EDIT. Forgot to add that I tried adding iron as well as Comprehensive a few years ago on the advice of probably well-meaning individuals, and within a few weeks my floating plants were melting. The Red Tiger Lotus also began to disintegrate. I stopped the iron, and in a few weeks the plants showed signs of recovery.

 

[seangee]

This tank has RO water.
pH is less than 5.5.
Flourish root tabs on the left side.
Flourish comprehensive once a week at half the recommended dosage when I remember.
No CO2
Plain river sand (no nutrients)
Probably much less light than yours because of the floating plants on the right and the vals folded over the surface on the left

FWIW the pic was taken a few minutes ago, just in case you think I am recycling an old photo from that one day when my tank looked good
Also FWIW the reason i removed my amazon swords is the bristlenose hates them and destroys any I try to plant.

 

[Fishguy134]

If you use a reliable comprehensive (complete) fertilizer, you should not add additional iron. This is likely to harm the plants and fish. The 17 nutrients plant require need to be proportional to each other. Excesses of some nutrients can cause plants to shut down assimilation of other nutrients. When you are dealing with a fish tank that happens to have plants, the fish must be the priority. This does not mean you cannot add plant additives, but what you add must be minimal.

Going back to the fish you have listed...these are soft water species. With one exception, the knight goby. This species actually does better in slightly alkaline conditions and with sea salt as in a semi-brackish set-up. However, the other soft water species will be harmed by any sea salt, so you have a problem. The goby should not be in with the other fish. There are other very serious issues here too, with the loaches especially. If I get into that this thread will really get involved, so I will leave it and stay with plant nutrition.

You could mix in some source water, to reach say 4 dGH. The soft water fish should have no issues with this. I actually did something similar for a few years, using Seachem's Equilibrium to maintain a GH of 4-5 dGH. After a discussion with a couple of marine biologists, I stopped the Equilbirum, and went to the Flourish Tabs plus Flourish Comprehensive, and the two provided the necessary calcium for my plants without harming the fish.

RO water is fine for the soft water species (not the goby), and plants will be OK as well with a comprehensive fertilizer. Seachem's Flourish Tabs will work for the swords, and their Flourish Comprehensive Supplement for the Planted Aquarium will work for all of the plants. I have basically RO water coming out of my tap, GH and KH are zero with a quite acidic pH, and my plants thrive using the two afore-mentioned products. I've been doing this for over a decade now.

EDIT. Forgot to add that I tried adding iron as well as Comprehensive a few years ago on the advice of probably well-meaning individuals, and within a few weeks my floating plants were melting. The Red Tiger Lotus also began to disintegrate. I stopped the iron, and in a few weeks the plants showed signs of recovery.

Ok, Yea I haven't added any iron since then. I tried to pick species that do alright in the same conditions as the knight goby. However there is a complicated situation with this tank because I was away from it for 3 years (still my tank) and my parents were taking care of it. They are... not so scientific when it comes to fish care. They just kind of throw fish in a tank follow the absolute minimum basics and then wonder why the fish is dead a year later. The tank originally had a green spotted puffer in it, and they INSISTED on it having tank mates. After the puffer passed away, I didn't want to mess with brackish setups anymore. I read that you can slowly adapt knight gobies to alkaline freshwater. I did that and he seems to be quite alright.

Good to know about the iron however, I will continue with frequent small water changes and flourish comprehensive nutrient routine and see if the condition of the tank improves. I should be getting my GH/KH kit in the mail here soon too. I do intend to move the clown loaches out at some point, I know this current setup is small for them.

 

[Fishguy134]

This tank has RO water.
pH is less than 5.5.
Flourish root tabs on the left side.
Flourish comprehensive once a week at half the recommended dosage when I remember.
No CO2
Plain river sand (no nutrients)
Probably much less light than yours because of the floating plants on the right and the vals folded over the surface on the left
View attachment 105549
FWIW the pic was taken a few minutes ago, just in case you think I am recycling an old photo from that one day when my tank looked good
Also FWIW the reason i removed my amazon swords is the bristlenose hates them and destroys any I try to plant.

WOW! Looks great! Definitely how I want my plants to look. My loaches seem to uproot any plants with insignificant root systems as well, which then drift over to my filter. I feel like the key to a good planted aquarium is tests and knowledge. I should have invested in getting as many test kits as possible when I got into the hobby. I feel like that would have really helped avoid many of my mistakes I have made so far.

I checked in at the local aquarium store. They have a good rap in my area, and tend to have more rare plants and fish species. I got an assorted bag of floaters which had water lettuce included.

 

[seangee]

I feel like the key to a good planted aquarium is tests and knowledge. I should have invested in getting as many test kits as possible when I got into the hobby.

Have to confess I'm too lazy for all of that. Root tabs and flourish comprehensive is all I do, and no testing for nutrients. A long time ago I had a high tech tank with high lights, CO2, daily ferts and every test known to man before I realised this wasn't good for fish. It was also way to much work having to trim the plants in a 450l tank every week.

It does need a bit of patience to get the lighting right by trial and error (both intensity and duration). Its different in each of my tanks. This one gets 10 hours a day, My other tanks get 6 & 7. After that I just use plants that work in my tank and stick with easy plants. In the tank pictured I cannot grow water sprite or elodea, both supposedly easy beginner plants. So I chucked them out and tried something else that did work.

One thing that I believe helps massively (this is personal opinion) is minimal filtration. For years I was a slave to the idea that there is no such thing as too much filtration. Then I realised that plants love ammonia and would not get any if the filters took it out of the water before the plants had a chance. Also filters produce nitrates and plants don't. I know nitrate is a fertiliser but plants prefer ammonia, and will only use nitrate if they can't find ammonia. Nowadays I think of the tank itself as the bio filter (meaning plants and substrate) and the filter only exists to circulate water and remove solid waste. Caution: Don't reduce your filtration until you know the tank can deal with the load

 

[Fishguy134]

Have to confess I'm too lazy for all of that. Root tabs and flourish comprehensive is all I do, and no testing for nutrients. A long time ago I had a high tech tank with high lights, CO2, daily ferts and every test known to man before I realised this wasn't good for fish. It was also way to much work having to trim the plants in a 450l tank every week.

It does need a bit of patience to get the lighting right by trial and error (both intensity and duration). Its different in each of my tanks. This one gets 10 hours a day, My other tanks get 6 & 7. After that I just use plants that work in my tank and stick with easy plants. In the tank pictured I cannot grow water sprite or elodea, both supposedly easy beginner plants. So I chucked them out and tried something else that did work.

One thing that I believe helps massively (this is personal opinion) is minimal filtration. For years I was a slave to the idea that there is no such thing as too much filtration. Then I realised that plants love ammonia and would not get any if the filters took it out of the water before the plants had a chance. Also filters produce nitrates and plants don't. I know nitrate is a fertiliser but plants prefer ammonia, and will only use nitrate if they can't find ammonia. Nowadays I think of the tank itself as the bio filter (meaning plants and substrate) and the filter only exists to circulate water and remove solid waste. Caution: Don't reduce your filtration until you know the tank can deal with the load

I used to be all about filtration too. I used to have a little green spotted puffer in that tank, and because they are brackish fish who are very territorial, and need 35G all to themselves practically. I never got to make beautiful aquascapes with that fish. Now that I know more, im wondering if the reason no plants could survive was more because of the lighting, substrate and nutrients and not the brackish water. Anyways, the puffer demanded very high filtration because they are very messy eaters. After I had to leave the tank to my parents for college It pretty got the bare minimum treatment needed to keep a high maintenance fish like a puffer alive. Now I only have a rock bag for bacteria and a sponge in that filter. The rocks and plants in there probably deal with most of the waste anyways.

Now Im more in the water change group because the RO water I use should be void of heavy metals that could hurt the fish, It keeps the process quite simple, and takes a lot of unknowns out of the equation. Though I occasionally use water conditioner just to neutralize anything that may be building up. It is also to my understanding that a lot of plants filter out heavy metals themselves.

 

[Byron]

Now Im more in the water change group because the RO water I use should be void of heavy metals that could hurt the fish, It keeps the process quite simple, and takes a lot of unknowns out of the equation. Though I occasionally use water conditioner just to neutralize anything that may be building up. It is also to my understanding that a lot of plants filter out heavy metals themselves.

Some of the "heavy metals" are necessary plant nutrients, for example iron, copper, zinc, manganese. Obviously these are not present in RO water, and some may not be present in ordinary tap water either, so adding a comprehensive plant fertilizer provides all you need. Without chlorine/chloramine I would myself not use a conditioner as this is only adding more chemicals unnecessarily. And if used in conjunction with a plant liquid fertilzer it can negate the heavy metals. I went into this discussion with Seachem lab people a few years ago, and the result is that I now add the Flourish Comprehensive Supplement the day following the water change. I've no evidence how effective this may or may not be, or necessary, but it hasn't hurt my plants or fish, and it does mean one less chemical entering the tank at the same time as another if I spread them out.

 

[seangee]

I don't bother with conditioner as there is nothing in RO water that needs to be removed.

 

[Fishguy134]

Some of the "heavy metals" are necessary plant nutrients, for example iron, copper, zinc, manganese. Obviously these are not present in RO water, and some may not be present in ordinary tap water either, so adding a comprehensive plant fertilizer provides all you need. Without chlorine/chloramine I would myself not use a conditioner as this is only adding more chemicals unnecessarily. And if used in conjunction with a plant liquid fertilzer it can negate the heavy metals.

Hmmm, I did have that thought. I haven't done that in a while though. My tap water is iron heavy, without softener salt the water tends to stain everything a little red, so just something to be careful of.

Update:
I checked out my little local fish store. They had some prepackaged assorted floaters bags which included water lettuce, duckweed, and java moss along with a few other mystery species that I couldn't immediately identify. I put the java moss and water lettuce in my tank, and put the rest in my mothers gold fish tank because they didn't have enough buoyancy to stay out of my filter intake. I made an air hose barrier around the waterfall filter too because the water lettuce was getting trapped underneath the waterfall. As for the duckweed, I think it already disappeared. lifted my filter and some of it had been sucked into the sponge.

I know java moss struggles with algae in high light. I just figured it would be a waste to toss it, and the water conditions in my tank work for it.

 

[Byron]

Hmmm, I did have that thought. I haven't done that in a while though. My tap water is iron heavy, without softener salt the water tends to stain everything a little red, so just something to be careful of.

In case you are not already aware of this...the detoxification of heavy metals (like iron) in conditioners is temporary. As Seachem explained it, the conditioner is intended to detoxify low levels of heavy metals such as what might come through tap water which cannot have toxic levels by law, so the "iron" would not be substantial to begin with. This detoxification being temporary is gone after 24-36 hours.

 

[Stan510]

What you need is more iron,Seachem,and you need to add more plants to outcompete the algae. Stem plants like Bacopa or Rotala or Ludwigia.
I would never make an aquarium with many fish it and have still waters afraid to drive out Co2. Fish always do better in highly aerated water. You might not need to run the vortex on the powerhead if its agitating the surface..but its not a bad idea.
I even think the vortex ADDS to the Co2 in the tank as it brings atmosphere Co2 down into the water and mixes the two together. Just my theory.

 

[Fishguy134]

What you need is more iron,Seachem,and you need to add more plants to outcompete the algae. Stem plants like Bacopa or Rotala or Ludwigia.
I would never make an aquarium with many fish it and have still waters afraid to drive out Co2. Fish always do better in highly aerated water. You might not need to run the vortex on the powerhead if its agitating the surface..but its not a bad idea.
I even think the vortex ADDS to the Co2 in the tank as it brings atmosphere Co2 down into the water and mixes the two together. Just my theory.

As said above, I did add more iron. It temporarily increased growth, but then it suddenly slowed and some leaves began to show signs of deficiency of other elements. As Byron said, too much iron causes plants to stop processing other nutrients. I already had root tabs and flourish comprehensive going in, I think that shot of Iron did just that and threw off the balance.

I thought about getting a lily funnel. I see a lot of competition tanks with those, and they arent that expensive. But they are designed for canister filters (Intake goes on the outside of the tank) and I have a waterfall filter. So I supposed I could DIY an adapter to the powerhead, connect a hose to it that loops outside of the tank into a lily funnel. I think that better aeration does increase CO2 but ONLY if you have a very low amount of CO2 though. Something to note is that drop indicator solution does not turn yellow or green when exposed to the atmosphere (at least mine doesn't). So I wouldn't expect natural aeration to significantly increase CO2 enough to get to 15-20 ppm. It would however probably make sure the water always has some CO2 in it.

 

[Fishguy134]

You could mix in some source water, to reach say 4 dGH. The soft water fish should have no issues with this. I actually did something similar for a few years, using Seachem's Equilibrium to maintain a GH of 4-5 dGH. After a discussion with a couple of marine biologists, I stopped the Equilbirum, and went to the Flourish Tabs plus Flourish Comprehensive, and the two provided the necessary calcium for my plants without harming the fish.

So I got my GH/KH test kit today... And my KH was at around 1dKH and my GH.. Well it was at 16-17 dGH.. I have no idea how a tank gets that hard while using RO water. I was using buffer solutions and maybe those might do it. I imagine that Flourish comprehensive is boosting that as well. But I suspect that a dGH that high has got to be messing with the plants.

 

[Byron]

So I got my GH/KH test kit today... And my KH was at around 1dKH and my GH.. Well it was at 16-17 dGH.. I have no idea how a tank gets that hard while using RO water. I was using buffer solutions and maybe those might do it. I imagine that Flourish comprehensive is boosting that as well. But I suspect that a dGH that high has got to be messing with the plants.

Flourish Comprehensive will not raise the GH at all, unless you overdose it to extreme (I guess it might, never done this) but that would kill the fish and invertebrates. Buffer solutions shouldn't increase GH, but what are you using? What is the substrate?

Also, if the test is the API, you consider the first change from orange to green even though minimal as the number. I have known some people who add more drops until it is dark green, but that is not necessary. View the colour through the tube from the open end when standing on a white surface, it is easier to see the colour than through the side.

 

[Fishguy134]

Flourish Comprehensive will not raise the GH at all, unless you overdose it to extreme (I guess it might, never done this) but that would kill the fish and invertebrates. Buffer solutions shouldn't increase GH, but what are you using? What is the substrate?

Also, if the test is the API, you consider the first change from orange to green even though minimal as the number. I have known some people who add more drops until it is dark green, but that is not necessary. View the colour through the tube from the open end when standing on a white surface, it is easier to see the colour than through the side.

Substrate is some mystery black and white sand I bought years ago, the new substrate that has naturally drifted to the top (I replace some the old sand with it) is caribsea Eco-complete. If I had to guess at what would be adding so much GH, I would say it is probably some of the decorative rocks I have in there. I tested to the light green on the gh, drop by drop. I will redo the test tomorrow on the water, and then I think I will prepare for a water change, buffering as usual. I will measure the water going in just in case something is happening in the preparation process. I really doubt the RO water would have any natural hardness at all, it's coming from somewhere.