my porposed reply to a rc thread

[beaslbob]

my proposed reply to a rc thread

This one:


Freshwater question: Why airstones - Reef Central Online Community

my proposed reply:

Sure there are good reasons for not using airstones in marine tanks.

But with either FW or marine setups, carbon dioxide lowering and oxygen increasing is much more effectively done with plant life. Fw live plants-- marine various algaes.

With the plant life you get a tank that becomes a net consumer of carbon dioxide and producer of oxygen each 24 hour period.

Regardless of the circulation methods used, air gas interchange and so on.

my .02

so I double dog dare anyone to post that on rc.


:xd:

 

[H@rry]

Bob, if I could I would; out of respect for your knowledge of all things pertaining to macro algae, but alas; my opinion is no more respected there than yours. Sorry! :burn_joss_stick:

 

[beaslbob]

awwwwwwwwwww

that's ok H@rry.

:angel:

 

[Yerboy]

I'm not scared

 

[Tomoko Schum]

I suppose I can post it, but I have a different opinion.

With the plant life you get a tank that becomes a net consumer of carbon dioxide and producer of oxygen each 24 hour period.

The plant life is a net consumer of CO2 during the daylight hours and not for 24 hour period.

I use an airstone at night in my FW planted tank and so does Amano because aquatic plants use O2 and discharge CO2 when it's not photosynthesizing. All the aquatic plants, livestock, and omnipotent bacteria (which are the biggie actually) consume O2 and they can really deplete O2 at night even though a planted tank is saturated with O2 during the day. When you have a lot of aquatic plants like I do, the plants can certainly put a dent in the O2 level at night. I have seen my neon tetras breathing hard (like panting) just before light comes on when an airstone was not used. I don't know if O2 dissolves in water much just with airstone, but it certainly agetates the water surface and drives out CO2.

 

[mike_dani]

Dam that Yerboy he got there before I did

Quote:
Originally Posted by yerboy
Sure there are good reasons for not using airstones in marine tanks.

But with either FW or marine setups, carbon dioxide lowering and oxygen increasing is much more effectively done with plant life. Fw live plants-- marine various algaes.

With the plant life you get a tank that becomes a net consumer of carbon dioxide and producer of oxygen each 24 hour period.

Regardless of the circulation methods used, air gas interchange and so on.


+1

Sure there are good reasons for not using airstones in marine tanks.

But with either FW or marine setups, carbon dioxide lowering and oxygen increasing is much more effectively done with plant life. Fw live plants-- marine various algaes.

With the plant life you get a tank that becomes a net consumer of carbon dioxide and producer of oxygen each 24 hour period.

Regardless of the circulation methods used, air gas interchange and so on.

 

[Yerboy]

working on my troll status

 

[beaslbob]

thanks to all

Hope mike and yerboy don't ruin thier reputations on rc. :bigsmile:

Tomoko does raise a good point and we both agree about the lights on effects. And I do respect her experience with panting neons. Perhaps I have just not noticed that effect.

For the record there is a reason I state the 24 hour period. Sure depending on alk the ph does drop with lights off. But in my experience the lowest planted tank pH (just before light on) is still much higher then the highest pH in unplanted tanks. Which to me indicates that the tank has become a net consumer of carbon dioxide and producer of oxygen in a 24 hour period.

On my uncirculated fw tanks with no mechanical filtration I measure a pH of 8.4-8.8 (purple on the api high range pH kit). Even in tanks where I use 1" of peat moss in the substrate.

When I first setup my 55g marine tank I had a ph of 7.6 with a heavy fish load and no macro algaes. A little baking soda did raise the ph over 8 but a few days later it was down 7.6 again. I added several macro algaes and in a day pH was over 8 and a week later 8.4-8.8. the pH stayed at those levels for years with no dosing. I did have a nightly pH drop to 7.9 before I brought up the alk. After that the pH seemed to not drop as much at night.

So to me you can do all the gas exhange until you are blue in the face. Or use pumps. You can reventilate your entire house. Add fans and so on. But all I did was add plants.


my .02