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I need to change regime, will this work or any ideas??

julioarca

Seedling
Joined
20 Apr 2008
Messages
21
I have tried to set my DIY co2 away but even if I aerate during the night I still have sicky Discus the next day. I have now stopped co2 input in the tank and need some help to change.

I have my Juwel 180l tank, 2x30w Aquaglow tubes and 1 Sunglow tube with reflectors. Lights on for about 10 hours with a lights off for approx 1.5 hours during the day.

SOOOO what are the plants I need to grow sucessfully in a non co2 tank of my lighting level. I currently am dosing PMDD and want to continue with this method. If I can have a listing of plants that would suit and a location plan of where abouts they go in a tank, it would be great.

Thanks

David
 
What do you mean sicky discus? Co2 shouldn't effect them that badly especially not considering you have diy which in my experiance you would struggle to get enough for plants let alone to gas your fish.

I'd say its an outside element and not CO2 that's causing "sicky" fish.
 
It's also not clear how you plan to pull off a high tech system without some form of CO2. If you will not use CO2 then you should lower the light to below 2WPG and run a low tech tank. PMDD or any high tech dosing scheme then becomes moot. You cannot do both low tech and high tech at the same time, either figure out a solution to CO2 or lower the light and nutrients.

Cheers,
 
Hes a basic list of plants

Foreground (yes, there are foreground plants, just have to be creative)

java moss
Christmas moss
Willow moss
Marsilea quadrifolia
Hemianthus micranthemoides (can grow towards the light or behave and stay a lovely little bush). Mine behave.
Hemianthus callitrichoides (same as HM)
Small cryptocorynes (parva, lutea, lucens, etc)
Anubia petite nana

Midground (lots more options)

Mid-sized crypts (wendtii, others, excellent plant)
Barclaya longifolia (can get big, can also behave)
Nymphaea species (must be taught to behave, otherwise a background plant)
Anubias (barterii, coffeefolia, barterii var nana, others)
Anubia gracilis (does better emersed rather than submerged)
Java fern
Bolbitis heudelotii (when small a midground)

Background plants (many options)

Most hygrophile species
rotala rotundifolia
Egeria densa
Egeria najas
Limnophila sessilifolia and indica and aquatica
Hydrocotyle leucocephala (Brazilian pennywort)
Nymphaea species
Amazon swords
Bacopa species
Bolbitis heudlotii (when full grown, a very slow grower)
Alternantera reineckii (striking plant, can do low-light with CO2)
Vallisneria (americana, asiatica, spiralis)
Some Sagittaria species

Sam
 
wow you guys have done me proud....thanks a billion. The c02 issue....the Discus started turning upside down and swimming nose down and at the top. I have had no co2 on now for 3 days and the fish are fine, feeding and behaving 100% normal.
 
If the tank is heavily stocked, injecting CO2 overnight might be pushing the levels too high. Remember that plants use up oxygen at night, not CO2 and the fish use up oxygen and give out CO2 all the time. Therefore, if you inject CO2 24/7 your CO2 levels will be higher at night which might be causing problems.

You could unplug your DIY CO2 each evening, or alternatively use an air pump timed to come on overnight to drive off the CO2.
 
My fish also struggled for oxygen sometimes, so I added an air pump to come on during the night for 3/4 hours and they have always been fine since then. Only affected certain species, or certain species show more the effects than others.
 
An alternative is to replace your diffusers with water pumps with venturi diffusers. Attach the DIY CO2 line to this/these and plug the pump into a timer set to come on about an hour or so before light on and off about 2 hours before lights out. Whilst the pump is off at night the majority of the CO2 will bubble away to the surface harmlessly, whilst during the day you will get very small CO2 bubbles been circulated nicely into the water column by the flow from the pump, so you in effect 'kill 2 birds with 1 stone', as in you will make your DIY CO2 system more efficient during the day whilst almost mimicking the effects of having a night time solenoid on a pressurised system at night.

Also remember that ANY surface agitation will help to drive off CO2 at night, not just the output of an air pump, so if you don't want the noise of an airpump but still need more agitation you could use powerheads/waterpumps set at the surface to come on at night.

Hope this helps.

Ade
 
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