Comments on: 15. Planted Aquarium

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 09:07:07 +0000

In reply to anooooooo ……… It ain’t easy. Read this for the complete lowdown. http://tankstartguide.com/index.php/16-2-controlling-algae/

By: anoooooooooooooooooooo

anoooooooooooooooooooo — Thu, 11 Dec 2025 01:22:57 +0000

how can I get the alge at bay

By: Alex Powell

Alex Powell — Sat, 19 Oct 2024 23:36:14 +0000

Hi Dave,
I had a look in the Father Fish discord, and they are now recommending over filtration. The guides that they have set up are actually screenshots from this site – so well done on converting them with your accurate knowledge.

Unfortunately the discord has a “no advice” rule, and I was banned after answering how to calculate the volume of an aquarium. Oh well.

By: Confused fish keeper

Confused fish keeper — Sun, 08 Sep 2024 00:13:45 +0000

Thank You so much for helping explain the fish/ plant conundrum. I’ve happily and successfully kept fish for 50 yrs. I’ve recently been struggling with trying to balance “natural” aquariums. Trying to emulate popular videos on you tube. I’m spending a small fortune and tons of time and energy, only to feel guilty and wonder what I’m doing wrong, because I’ve lost so many fish and my plants are struggling. I Have a medium planted 75 gal with 1- 6″ Shubunkin, 2- 6″ veil Angel and 3- 2″ clown loach. The large fish in the 75 gal are territorial. Also have 32 gal medium planted with 1- 3″ fantail, 2- 2″ veil Angel, 5 corys, 5 Black Neon, 5 Sparkling Gourami, 5 White Cloud. I see now that the 32 gal is heavily stocked. I’ve just switched both from under gravel to only 1/2″ of sand. both have aeration and cannister filters. ANY suggestions/ comments would be helpful.

By: cliff

cliff — Wed, 04 Sep 2024 16:44:10 +0000

What is the best way to root feed with sand substrate? root tabs fro seachem and api are not working

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sat, 31 Aug 2024 06:04:53 +0000

By: Dave

Dave — Fri, 16 Feb 2024 08:31:25 +0000

In reply to JON. In reply to JON .... Fully aerated water will have two to three parts per million CO2 in it.

By: JON

JON — Thu, 15 Feb 2024 18:14:06 +0000

Hi, I only took Chemistry in highschool and 1st year in college so know very little about it.

Plain air has about 400ppm of CO2 in it. What will the ppm in water be if you aerate plain air into water? will it still be only 3ppm of CO2 in water?

I am just curious if aeration will really lower the CO2 level in the water when the only CO2 source is some few fishes in a low tech, walstead or fatherfish tank.

By: Dave

Dave — Fri, 26 Jan 2024 06:56:29 +0000

In reply to Tom. In reply to Tom .... You make a good point A "pure" low tech low stocking tank might well benefit from starting a period of aeration after a period of lighting has decreased the CO2 below 3 ppm.

By: Tom

Tom — Thu, 25 Jan 2024 21:43:18 +0000

On most of the planted aquarium types discussed here, various mechanisms are used to raise CO2 above 3 ppm (that is, above equilibrium with surrounding air), so any aeration will drive CO2 undesirably down toward 3 ppm. Minimizing aeration therefore helps the tank retain the excess CO2. I’m struggling on why you’d want to minimize aeration in the low-tech planted aquarium. In a low-tech aquarium, the only source of CO2 is respiration. Following the above recommendations on lightly stocking fish, I’d expect photosynthesis would consume CO2 faster than respiration would generate it. Therefore, with the lights on, CO2 will plummet below 3 ppm equilibrium. Wouldn’t maximizing aeration help replenish CO2 back toward 3 ppm? Obviously 3 ppm CO2 isn’t much, but isn’t that the strategy of the low-tech aquarium?