Store Bought Co2 Or Home-Made

[Crossfire]

I'm planning on getting a 20 gal medium planted tank, and i found tht one needs a CO2 injector to allow the plants to "breathe" and live well. I found a CO2 kit at PetsMart for $30 but it has an unsightly bubble diffuser that will be hard to hide behind plants. Plus the refill packets are expensive. Or should I make my own CO2 kit and save money and keep my tank beautiful???

 

[Dj-damo]

im using a diy home system, 450 litre tank running 4 x 2 litre bottles. plants are growing fast, but so is the algea.
i am looking into a pressurised system. but could be costly

 

[StandbySetting]

Keep it simple, go for a low light set up and you wont need CO2.

 

[nurglespuss]

Good advice.

If you use pressurised CO2, none of the methods/equipment/upkeep costs are that cheap.

There are some very innovative guides out there for using home made CO2 (best advice I can give is to buy champagne yeast).

But, as SS says, you don't have to use CO2 in the right setup.

I java fern in a bogstandard 2 foot tank with no CO2, and just a standard (now quite old!) 12" flouresent tube, and it grows like crazy (don't use ferts either).

I also have Elodea, java fern and mosses in a small setup with an arcadia arcpod and not CO2/ferts, growing great.

Finally, I have a pressurised CO2 setup, that I'm new to, and am struggling to get as good growth in some plants (and deal with other things!)

 

[Crossfire]

Keep it simple, go for a low light set up and you wont need CO2.

That's actually perfect for me! The 20 gallon i bought came with an LED strip instead of actual bulbs, so I can only get low-light plants like anubias and java fern. This works out perfectly, i'm so happy now Thanks for telling me, because I might have accidentally killed my fish with excess CO2