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Lean dosing pros and cons

The natural level of CO2 in our tanks is a <"really interesting question">, the <"equilibrium value"> (at <"418 ppm atmospheric CO2"> and 20 oC) is about 0.6 ppm and "3 ppm" is often quoted, but the only reference we could find for this was <"George Booth's at the Krib">. I'm guessing that 3 ppm is nearer than 0.6 or 10 ppm, but it would be <"purely a guess">.

I would agree and suspect no one with a low tech tank is able to get above 3ppm unless they have some something unusual going on.

10ppm would register as a visible colour change on a drop checker.
 
he natural level of CO2 in our tanks is a <"really interesting question">, the <"equilibrium value"> (at <"418 ppm atmospheric CO2"> and 20 oC) is about 0.6 ppm and "3 ppm" is often quoted, but the only reference we could find for this was <"George Booth's at the Krib">. I'm guessing that 3 ppm is nearer than 0.6 or 10 ppm, but it would be <"purely a guess">.

Hi Darrel, I was looking into this a while ago. The only reference to the "3 ppm" I was able to find was the George Booth findings as well... One bit that is often overlooked when Booth is quoted is:
"CO2 concentrations and pH were measured with LaMotte test kits. Note
that the LaMotte CO2 test kit has a resolution of 1 ppm (mg/l) and an
error of about +/- 2 ppm."


I think the 0.55 - 0.6 ppm range derived from Henry's Law is probably much closer to reality than the 3 ppm found by Booth.

Cheers,
Michael
 
Also, and this is very important in my opinion. I am always very worry/critical on peoples journals and what they decide to share. For two simple reasons.
1. Bias. No one is free from it and we don't know from the comfort of our chair, behind our screens what is happening with a specific tank 24/7, year round. And that is also why conversation on these subjects will keep on going forever. People share specific moments/periods of their tanks, not a continuous stream. Snapshots are great but don't provide the full story but obviously it's interesting to read and try to understand what is happening.
Hi @Hanuman I very much agree. And I think we see that more often than we tend acknowledge; people backing their claims with pictorial evidence, to drive home a point or an opinion (bias if you will) without given much specifics or even speaking to the long term sustainability etc. What is particularly interesting to me about the TPT OP is the convincing timeline he provides - from June 2019 to Jan. 2022, some 2.5 years. without anything from the pictures that suggest he changed (re-planted) the tank several times over in that timeframe. I am not an aquascaper and I tend to try and keep my tanks going for as long as possible without changing things up a whole lot. I may add or change out some plants once in a while, but otherwise I like to achieve stability and watch things evolve slowly and naturally.

That said, I am thinking about changing up one if my tanks swapping out a lot of the plant mass with the more challenging plants and try to see if I can achieve anything similar to the TPT OP's results. With respect to water parameters this tank is actually not too far off. I will need to move out the livestock from this particular tank if I have to drop the temp several degrees (currently at 74F/23C), but otherwise as for KH (~1) ,GH (~6) and pH (~6.2) I don't need to do much. The biggest change would be temperature, fertilizer regime and of course light levels.

Cheers,
Michael
 
Hi all,
I think the 0.55 - 0.6 ppm range derived from Henry's Law is probably much closer to reality than the 3 ppm found by Booth.
There are some references in the <"linked thread">.
This one <"Dissolved CO2 in freshwater systems">, has some figures, that suggest that lakes and rivers typically have between four and eight times more CO2 than they would at equilibrium (0.6 ppm CO2), so we are back somewhere near the "3ppm CO2" figure.
cheers Darrel
 
@MichaelJ would be interested to hear and see how your tank is doing, If i remember correctly you were planning on lowering TDS for shrimp?
 
Hi all,

There are some references in the <"linked thread">.

cheers Darrel
Hi Darrel, Thanks for pointing me back to that J. Cole paper. I wonder to what extent these findings are applicable to our aquariums - I figure as much as a lot of the additional CO2 is from Bacteria respiration.

Cheers,
Michael
 
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Hi all,
I figure as much as a lot of the additional CO2 is from Bacteria respiration.
I would think so. You can get huge amounts of CO2 in very polluted water, it was one of the reasons why we used the trickle filters in our waste water work, they out-gassed the CO2 pretty efficiently (as well as allowing dissolved oxygen to diffuse in). You can also get high levels of CO2 in spring water, <"tufa formation"> is one of the results of this in hard water springs.

There are figures in <"Greenhouse Gases Emissions from Wastewater Treatment Plants: Minimization, Treatment, and Prevention">.

cheers Darrel
 
@MichaelJ would be interested to hear and see how your tank is doing, If i remember correctly you were planning on lowering TDS for shrimp?
Hi @plantnoobdude True, but this change/experiment would be a different tank and not the one where I keep shrimps. My other tank where I would do this experiment is pretty lightly stocked with tetras etc. and I can easily find a new happy home for those.

And btw. I finally got the shrimp tank down to the 120-130 ppm range, there is a bit more to go and I am waiting for the weather to warm up before I can get the CRS shipped in (probably a month or so).

Cheers,
Michael
 
Let's not focus too much on what happened over there at TPT
Indeed. Here's all the gory details from the horses mouth. Taken from a post by Gregg, so already in the public domain. Read it and let's move on.

Screenshot_20220303-204415_Lite.jpg

Screenshot_20220303-204617_Lite.jpg


Won't let me post the fb link, says post as been removed/privacy settings changed 🙄
 
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And btw. I finally got the shrimp tank down to the 120-130 ppm range, there is a bit more to go and I am waiting for the weather to warm up before I can get the CRS shipped in (probably a month or so).
nice! I'm planning to get some more crs after the ones I got before dropped one by one with super high EI tds and micros and co2. co2 is now at a much more reasonable level and I dose much less. still feel really guilty about the ones I killed due to my stupidity.... oh well, here's to hoping the next batch does better.
my tank is currently at 95ppm tds on tds500 scale.
I think urea helps because plants can rapidly uptake nh4 as it breaks down in water collumn ( I think) before it has a chance to be turned into the harder to use No3.

which leads to a question, does urea breakdown in water collumn? or inside the plant. or both? because if it breaks down in water, I am concerned about no2 spikes. but does no2 toxicity lower as ph lowers as well?
 
Thank you @Happi for the invitation.
Hello everyone,
My name is Sudipta Shaw and I am a brand new member of this society and the same person whose "non-CO2 supplemented tank thread" got deleted recently. I was quickly browsing here and noticed that there is some suspicion among the members about my results that I shared over TPT. So I thought it would be better if I introduce myself to all of you before going into the details sometime later.
I am originally from India and obtained my bachelors and masters degree in Microbiology over there. Then I came to the US and got my PhD in Biochemistry from Utah State University. I am currently working as a fulltime researcher at University of Minnesota. Although my planted tank journey only started in the summer of 2018 but I have been keeping fish and growing non-aquatic plants (primarily flowering plants and vegetables) since my childhood. I admire every aspect of nature and I am also passionate about wildlife photography.
You are more than welcome to check these links below if you want to know more about my passion for nature (primarily wildlife) and my scientific contributions in the form of publications. I am also attaching pictures of all 4 of my current non-CO2 supplemented tanks with similar parameters (largest and the oldest one is 20 gal tank, running since June 16, 2019 and that's the one I primarily presented at TPT). Couple of the plants in the last tank shown here are still under trial and I am not sure if they will survive long term in this environment. I did eventually post the pictures of other tanks in the comment section but unfortunately can't access them anymore. I also provided more details about algae in the comments which is also lost (yes I do get algae in my tanks but I have found that it is relatively easy to tackle them in my non-CO2 systems compared to an imbalanced pressurized CO2 injected tank, so yes I do have a high-tech tank). Although I briefly mentioned about importance of lower temperature (low 70F, 70-74F in my non-CO2 injected tanks but it is certainly possible to get good results at elevated temperatures of 80F or even slightly higher. However, It would require almost daily water changes (at least every other day in my opinion and yes I have done this in the past). It doesn't have to be very large water change, 15-25% water change every time should be good enough to maintain the health of plants. It is still quite a bit of work that's why I think it is better to keep the temperature in the lower range if possible. Please keep in mind that I am specifically talking about my non-CO2 setups (I think @MichaelJ has already shared the OP from the Google cache). I should also mention that I usually perform water change in all of my non-CO2 supplemented tanks during the light period, say 1-2 hours after the lights turn on (I forgot to mention this in the TPT post).
I am not saying that I can grow any plant in these systems or I know everything why I am able to grow many so called difficult plants in non-CO2 supplemented tanks but I am trying to the best of my knowledge to provide all the nitty-gritty details about my tanks which might help in the future for any hobbyist to replicate my results with more success.
Feel free to ask more questions and I will try my best to answer those.
Thanks,
Sudipta.



2022-02-24_11-07-15.jpg

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2022-02-10_08-12-38.jpg

20220212_192515.jpg
 
Thank you @Happi for the invitation.
Hello everyone,
My name is Sudipta Shaw and I am a brand new member of this society and the same person whose "non-CO2 supplemented tank thread" got deleted recently. I was quickly browsing here and noticed that there is some suspicion among the members about my results that I shared over TPT. So I thought it would be better if I introduce myself to all of you before going into the details sometime later.
I am originally from India and obtained my bachelors and masters degree in Microbiology over there. Then I came to the US and got my PhD in Biochemistry from Utah State University. I am currently working as a fulltime researcher at University of Minnesota. Although my planted tank journey only started in the summer of 2018 but I have been keeping fish and growing non-aquatic plants (primarily flowering plants and vegetables) since my childhood. I admire every aspect of nature and I am also passionate about wildlife photography.
You are more than welcome to check these links below if you want to know more about my passion for nature (primarily wildlife) and my scientific contributions in the form of publications. I am also attaching pictures of all 4 of my current non-CO2 supplemented tanks with similar parameters (largest and the oldest one is 20 gal tank, running since June 16, 2019 and that's the one I primarily presented at TPT). Couple of the plants in the last tank shown here are still under trial and I am not sure if they will survive long term in this environment. I did eventually post the pictures of other tanks in the comment section but unfortunately can't access them anymore. I also provided more details about algae in the comments which is also lost (yes I do get algae in my tanks but I have found that it is relatively easy to tackle them in my non-CO2 systems compared to an imbalanced pressurized CO2 injected tank, so yes I do have a high-tech tank). Although I briefly mentioned about importance of lower temperature (low 70F, 70-74F in my non-CO2 injected tanks but it is certainly possible to get good results at elevated temperatures of 80F or even slightly higher. However, It would require almost daily water changes (at least every other day in my opinion and yes I have done this in the past). It doesn't have to be very large water change, 15-25% water change every time should be good enough to maintain the health of plants. It is still quite a bit of work that's why I think it is better to keep the temperature in the lower range if possible. Please keep in mind that I am specifically talking about my non-CO2 setups (I think @MichaelJ has already shared the OP from the Google cache). I should also mention that I usually perform water change in all of my non-CO2 supplemented tanks during the light period, say 1-2 hours after the lights turn on (I forgot to mention this in the TPT post).
I am not saying that I can grow any plant in these systems or I know everything why I am able to grow many so called difficult plants in non-CO2 supplemented tanks but I am trying to the best of my knowledge to provide all the nitty-gritty details about my tanks which might help in the future for any hobbyist to replicate my results with more success.
Feel free to ask more questions and I will try my best to answer those.
Thanks,
Sudipta.



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Welcome to UKAPS, glad to have you here, you have some great looking tanks. It might be worth you detailing some of your tanks and techniques in the Journals section, so it doesn’t get lost in this thread.

I know it will probably mean covering old ground you have already posted on the other forum, but it would likely be of great value to many of us here, and at least it won’t get deleted on this forum! 😉
 
Welcome to UKAPS, glad to have you here, you have some great looking tanks. It might be worth you detailing some of your tanks and techniques in the Journals section, so it doesn’t get lost in this thread.

I know it will probably mean covering old ground you have already posted on the other forum, but it would likely be of great value to many of us here, and at least it won’t get deleted on this forum! 😉
Thank you for your appreciation. Yes you are absolutely right, I was actually thinking the same. however, I thought I should introduce myself to this group first as @Happi told me that people are already discussing about that thread here.
I will definitely start a new thread in the journal section.
Thanks,
 
I am currently working as a fulltime researcher at University of Minnesota.
Hi @Sudipta, Welcome to UKAPS! I hope you will feel right at home here on UKAPS! and great to see a fellow Minnesotan on the forum!

Also a BIG thanks to @Happi for "winning" you over!

Folks, strap on your seat belts... I think we are in for a ride!

Ok, I'll dispense with the celebrations... Now Mr. Shaw, how do I do it? :lol:

Cheers,
Michael
 
Hi @Sudipta, Welcome to UKAPS! I hope you will feel right at home here on UKAPS! and great to see a fellow Minnesotan on the forum!

Also a BIG thanks to @Happi for "winning" you over!

Folks, strap on your seat belts... I think we are in for a ride!

Ok, I'll dispense with the celebrations... Now Mr. Shaw, how do I do it? :lol:

Cheers,
Michael
Hello Michael,
I am planning to start my own thread soon in this forum. I will add all the information to begin with and then try to answer all the questions. I am sure anyone should be able to replicate my methods.
 
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