I shut off my filter yesterday afternoon to feed my discus and forgot to plug it back in. About an hour later I looked at my tank and some of my plants were bubbling a lot. I have a non co2 tank and this does not happen when the filter is on. I remembered when I was purchasing my plants 30 days ago the guy recommended I shut the filter off for two hours after 6 hours of lighting. He said he wanted the plants to remove all the co2 before the filter restarted. I'm using non co2 EI with very good results so far. Does this sound like a good strategy?
2 Hour Filter Shutoff?
- Thread starter Dolfan
- Start date
Re: 2 Hour Filter Shutoff?
Personally I wouldn't bother. If you keep discus they do need good water conditions, this is helped by the filter and the plants of course. As an alternative you could reduce the surface turbulance to a minimum but not to the point where you fish show signs of distress.
IMO pearling is not that important. If your plants are healthy and growing that's all you need. Pearling is merely when the water is saturated with O2, an indicator that the water column can hold no more oxygen.
Ian
Personally I wouldn't bother. If you keep discus they do need good water conditions, this is helped by the filter and the plants of course. As an alternative you could reduce the surface turbulance to a minimum but not to the point where you fish show signs of distress.
IMO pearling is not that important. If your plants are healthy and growing that's all you need. Pearling is merely when the water is saturated with O2, an indicator that the water column can hold no more oxygen.
Ian
Re: 2 Hour Filter Shutoff?
All you are seeing is the plants giving off O2 under non flowing conditions, the O2 will build up more since there is no movement and result in more pearling.
But the actually growth of the plants is decreased, less nutrients into the plants, less CO2 etc.
Plants will continue to give off O2 for awhile, maybe an hour or two, but the pearling is not an increase in growth, it's becuase you stopped the water from moving and allowed the O2 to build up so you can see the pearling.
The same thing occurs when you do a water change and do not turn the filter on for a few minutes.
Regards,
Tom Barr
All you are seeing is the plants giving off O2 under non flowing conditions, the O2 will build up more since there is no movement and result in more pearling.
But the actually growth of the plants is decreased, less nutrients into the plants, less CO2 etc.
Plants will continue to give off O2 for awhile, maybe an hour or two, but the pearling is not an increase in growth, it's becuase you stopped the water from moving and allowed the O2 to build up so you can see the pearling.
The same thing occurs when you do a water change and do not turn the filter on for a few minutes.
Regards,
Tom Barr