Yeast C02

[shasm]

I am setting up a new 40 gallon tank (currently cycling) and I have been wondering about setting up a c02 system for a planted aquarium. This 40g will house a jouvenile jack dempsey (named frady cat). Plants will be a challenge with him but don't they help an ecosystem? The c02 also lowers the ph, in this set up it has settled at about 6.8 to 7. It comes out of tap at 7.8ph. I have currently got a diy yeast powered c02 (generator). I have only been in the hobby for a little over a year and i am still learning. I have 55g with a young peacock bass (i know they get huge) and have had it running for about 15 months. I do not know what my kH is but when i first started i tried to lower ph with chemicals and it bounced back quickly, so if i understand right this means it has a decent kH. If i can get the plants to live I would like to do the same to the 55g. I would appreciate any feedback?

 

[shasm]

Checked water today in the 40 gallon. Amm. .25ppm, Nitrite 0, Nitrate 0, pH 7.1, temp 78. Tank Dimensions are Width 11.75", Length 35.5", and Height 22.75". I added a bottle of Tetra SafeStart after the checks this morning around 9:30 am. Last week I added a dozen small bait minnows for an ammonia supply (no one carries a straight ammonia water solution around here). I hope I don't regret doing this. Last night I got the filters installed and filled it up. I had to drain half of it to fix a lid problem. It had been running for about 2 weeks prior to that one week with nothing in it. I have a marineland 200 power filter (with bio wheel) and a magnum with a micron filter in it. From here on I will do daily water checks and see how it goes. Would still love to hear any iput from all about the CO2. There are no plants yet just seeds. I wish I had known about this site when I set up my 55gallon. I made a lot of mistakes, this site and the knowledgable folks here could have prevented some of my downfalls. Thanks everyone.

 

[shasm]

Test done at 7pm. Very strange readings. Maybe someone can help interpret. pH 6.6, Amm. .1, Nitrite 0, Nitrate 5, temp 77.9. I do not understand how i could have nitrate without seeing nitrite. Maybe i messed up the tests. Why is my ph dropping during the day, (the lights run from 1 till 9pm) there are no plants as of yet. I will check reading tom. Any feedback or input would be appreciated. Thanks

 

[shasm]

pH NH3/NH4+NO2 NO3 Temp
Ammonia Nirtite Nitrate Date Time
7.1 0.25 0 0 78 11-21-10 9:30 AM Day 14
6.6 0.1 0 5 77.9 11-21-10 7:30 PM

This is where i am at.

Sorry, that didn't work.



pH 7.1 9:30 am
6.6 7:00pm
Ammonia .25 9:30 am
.1 7:00pm
Nirtite 0 9:30am
0 7:00 pm
Nitrate 0 9:30am
5 7:00pm

 

[OldMan47]

Welcome to the forum Shasm.
You are experiencing first hand the pH affect of converting ammonia to nitrates. Ammonium hydroxide, the chemical version of common ammonia, is a base that tends to raise your pH. On the other hand, one of the more common forms that nitrates take is as nitric acid. Needless to say that will drop your tank water's pH. At a year out. you probably have established most of the needed bacteria to fully convert ammonia into nitrates which means you are far more likely to face a low pH situation than a high pH one. In your situation, I would expect to see the nitrate levels rising between water changes and see no ammonia, or very low levels of ammonia, during that time. It may be that something is going on in your tank that we do not understand, but my own feeling is that what you are seeing is not at all unexpected.

 

[shasm]

Thank you for your time oldman, i greatly appreciate all the info and help i can get.
Tonight, ph 7, amm .1, nitrite 0, nitrate 5. This is truly a great hobby. There is so much involved in keeping fish. Thank you once again.

 

[waterdrop]

Yes, hello from me too and welcome to TFF. I'm reading that we are on Day 14 of a Fish-In cycle of a 40G with bait minnows, whereas it's your older 55G that has been running a year, right?

If so, then I suspect the A-Bac (ammonia oxidizing bacteria) colony is just still really small. It can't process all the ammonia from the fish yet and the small stream of nitrite it has produced has at times been process right on to nitrate by a similar sized little colony of N-Bacs (nitrite oxidizing bacteria.) I'm assuming you haven't put any mature media from your 55G over in to the 40G, correct?

Have you read the Fish-In Cycling article?

~~waterdrop~~

 

[shasm]

Yes, day 15 now on the 40 gallon, and the 55 is just past year. I did actually seed a little from a smaller established tank. So maybe i just didn't see the little bit of nitrite? Do you think the bait minnows (shiners i think they call them) could introduce anything dangerous to a tropical fish? ( a jack who is risiding in the 20 gallon) I have no plans of rushing this set up. I would love to have live plants in this tank. I am messing around with home brew co2. I think basically i want to learn as much as i can while setting up this tank. And then apply what i learn to the 55 which is home to my buddy. Thanks for any help, i feel i am learning from reading the different threads here and trying to pay attention to the good advice.

 

[waterdrop]

Well, any fish can bring disease but also any freshwater fish will of course provide ammonia. Ammonia comes directly off the gills as waste and more ammonia is created when heterotrophic bacteria (different from the autotrophic bacteria we want to establish in our filters) break down the waste, excess food and plant debris in the tank. The trick in fish-in cycling is to stay within the narrow band of zero ppm to 0.25ppm for both ammonia and nitrite(NO2) so that the cycling fish stay alive.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[shasm]

Good info, thanks waterdrop. I am keeping a spreadsheet that i actually started on the 20th. The first two weeks of this tank were with many extreme water changes as I had to work on the tank top. So i did not start checking and recording till the 14th day.

 

[shasm]

40g cycle

 

[waterdrop]

Hi shasm, How is your Fish-In Cycling going? If it is still in progress it would be good to mention the rough size, number and type of fish (the shiners) in the txt file of your cycle log since that is the ammonia source for your cycle.

~~waterdrop~~

 

[shasm]

Hey WD, it is going great. Double zero's for a week now. Okay I will Do it, i really wasn't sure if anyone could even view it or not. I never did see a nitrite spike, wonder if the api test kit is out dated, it was opened a year ago. The fish show no signs of stress whatsoever. Well except for the ones that were eaten by the peacock. I Stocked the new tank over Friday and Saturday and all looks well tonight. I'm Still not sure what to do with the big fish. Just didn't think things through when I bought them. Even If I could afford a 300gal it still would not be large enough for a full grown peacock bass. It makes me mad that i was so stupid, the fish deserves more. Thanks for your input, this site is almost as addictive as fish keeping

 

[shasm]

This is where it is at. I just wonder if the stuff i bought and added helped, i researched it before and more than half of the users who took a poll said it did. I also pulled a large sponge from my fluval 405 and added to the 40g. Would really be fun to do some side by side testing with exact same setups and just see. Did I mention how much I am enjoying this forum.

 

[waterdrop]

Are you saying you added a mature sponge from a Fluval 405?