blasterman
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Have to disagree with some of the conclusions here.
Using Macro Algae to control pH is a bad idea. It's worth trying, but macros aren't guaranteed success and you need a heavy mass of them tp dent pH.
Anybody here run freshwater and used CO2 injection? Then you know how fast CO2 gets absorbed into water. Take a clear glass, invert it in your tank and fill it full of C02. Within a few hours the glass is full of water and the CO2 is gone. That's how fast water absorbs CO2.
So now we have to find a way to remove that tank CO2 that's forcing down pH. Forced gas exchange unfortunately has limited results because blowing airbubbles into your tank from out doors doesn't force dissolved CO2 to exit. It only displaces dissolved gasses in your tank with gasses that have a slightly lower ratio of CO2. Maybe if you blew straight nitrogen in your tank it would lower pH a lot, but it would certainly kill your fish. This is also why CO2 scrubbers have limited success.
My tank pH runs 8.1 to 8.15 during the day without assistance from sodium hydroxide and drops to 7.8 or lower at night. With all due respect to Randy I've blasted that tank with high powered air pumps sitting on my balcony until the water looked liked milk and pH barely moved. I live in an inner city in a Northern State with higher than normal CO2 levels and I'm fighting environmental conditions.
The only reliable way to remove CO2 at night IMO is chemical . All the big reef farms I've visited in my state run controlled kalk drips that keep pH nailed to 8.4. They can do this because they have such huge calcium and alk uptake and massive 4x8 foot open frag trays evaporating gallons of water per night they can dump pounds of kalk into their systems daily. They would likely switch to sodium hydroxide if they knew about it.
Most reefers can't do this. They don't have enough water evap or alk consumption to suppliment near enough kalk or sodium hydroxide to keep pH elevated 24/7. Those that do typically have a lot of evaporation and a lot of SPS.
Using Macro Algae to control pH is a bad idea. It's worth trying, but macros aren't guaranteed success and you need a heavy mass of them tp dent pH.
Anybody here run freshwater and used CO2 injection? Then you know how fast CO2 gets absorbed into water. Take a clear glass, invert it in your tank and fill it full of C02. Within a few hours the glass is full of water and the CO2 is gone. That's how fast water absorbs CO2.
So now we have to find a way to remove that tank CO2 that's forcing down pH. Forced gas exchange unfortunately has limited results because blowing airbubbles into your tank from out doors doesn't force dissolved CO2 to exit. It only displaces dissolved gasses in your tank with gasses that have a slightly lower ratio of CO2. Maybe if you blew straight nitrogen in your tank it would lower pH a lot, but it would certainly kill your fish. This is also why CO2 scrubbers have limited success.
My tank pH runs 8.1 to 8.15 during the day without assistance from sodium hydroxide and drops to 7.8 or lower at night. With all due respect to Randy I've blasted that tank with high powered air pumps sitting on my balcony until the water looked liked milk and pH barely moved. I live in an inner city in a Northern State with higher than normal CO2 levels and I'm fighting environmental conditions.
The only reliable way to remove CO2 at night IMO is chemical . All the big reef farms I've visited in my state run controlled kalk drips that keep pH nailed to 8.4. They can do this because they have such huge calcium and alk uptake and massive 4x8 foot open frag trays evaporating gallons of water per night they can dump pounds of kalk into their systems daily. They would likely switch to sodium hydroxide if they knew about it.
Most reefers can't do this. They don't have enough water evap or alk consumption to suppliment near enough kalk or sodium hydroxide to keep pH elevated 24/7. Those that do typically have a lot of evaporation and a lot of SPS.
