Airation Causing Plant Pearling. WTF????

Ok so I've been experiencing something kinda weird the past few weeks. I have a "high tech" planted tank (co2 injected and 3.2 wpg CFL + t5).
I have been testing some thing out for the past few months because my tank really hasn't been pearling much. I moved my filter outlet so there was no surface agitation, I have been adding more nutrients, I have increased the tank KH and GH, I got a drop checker to make sure my PH KH CO2 relationship wast being overly affected by something, I calibrated and got a new probe for my PH controller. Well, Everything is fine and i stumbled on a few things i'm going to try long term like keeping my KH higher.

Now for the question:
I tried adding an air stone because I saw one in a pic of another nice looking planted tank, and about an hour later my tank was pearling A LOT more.
Anyone have any idea why this might be happening?

I even tried turning off the air stone for a day and the pearling went back to almost nothing so i know the air stone has something to do with it. I'm hoping someone can tell me what may be going on so i can change my set up slightly and turn off the air stone since i am not a huge fan of having one and it has the obvious effect of using A LOT more co2 to keep that concentration correct via my PH controller. My co2 actually air locked my filter last night which is hasn't done in years(i defuse through my filter). I'm stumped on this one.
Please help and thanks in advance

 

OH. Duhhh. so if their is a lot of O2 in the water already the bubbles of O2 produced by plants are actually bubbles. While before i was not adding and O2 so all the O2 being release (pearling) was being absorbed into the water. Am i right here?

Why is adjusting my co2 via a ph meter bad? It has worked well for years i think. As long as i know my Kh i can get pretty dang close to 30ppm C02 by adjusting my ph.
I know diffusing into a filter can cause airlock if you have the bubble rate to high but i have used this method for a long time as well. My co2 tank seems to last a lot longer doing it this way.

 

i just did this test a few hrs ago. My drop checker is actually a little past green (starting to get clearish yellow, Probably what you would call light lime green). My kh in the tank is very close to 4 dkh and i do have a 4 dkh test solution in the drop checker (I'm not sure what you mean by " 4 dKH carbonate based solution." do you just mean 4 kh ro water that has been adjusted with baking soda? if so this is what i have). Anyway the Ph was 6.5 and the kh being 4 that means i have 37ppm of co2 according to the chart which is pretty right on I'd say according to the drop checker and the ph controller. If anything I'm thinking the ph kh relationship is more accurate then the drop checker sense is numbers and not color judgment. Of course you have to be careful of buffers with the ph kh relationship which is the reason I've added the drop checker.
I'm not sure that my test results are confirming your thoughts? Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

I just flat out disagree with this thinking. i calibrate my ph probe regularly and replace it once a year. This is still less maintenance then a drop checker (although i do have both). If you keep you kh above 2 or 3 (i keep mine at 4) your ph swings very little so honestly its not much of a yo yo. I would say turning off the co2 at night (which i assume you must do) then turning it on during the day is more of a yo yo then keeping it within a .3 range on the ph meter.
Controlling co2 just seems like the more logical accurate choice to me in order to achieve 30ppm co2 as long as you watch out for buffers. If you use buffers from time to time the the additional drop checker is necessary.

True my question was answered. To bad i made myself look pretty dumb by asking it. lol.

As far as making my drop checker solution... I did use my kh test kit and about a hr of trial and error with a water bottle. but i got it spot on eventually. I went way over then dumped out half the water and added new tested again, repeat about 15 times. now i have a bottle of it in the fridge.
Dylan

P.S. I learned during these last few months that you must have a KH of at least 2 for plants to effectively use co2 so all you folks using strictly RO better start adding so baking soda. RO Rite does not raise KH enough which was another shock to me.

 

Thank you hani. I think both methods work very well.

 

Thank you Tom. From what i gather you are saying that as long as you keep your co2 between 20ppm to 40ppm your ok. However in the upper end your fish may not be so happy so start low and work up. Do you think a ph controller or the drop checker/bubble counter method does this better. Why? Do you think a combination of controller drop checker is the best method? Do you believe there is a best method?

I calibrate my new probe two weeks after I get it and then every three months after that. It will usually be off .2. which is the difference of about 10 ppm co2. Easy enough for me. My last probe lasted several years without any problems. The only reason I replaced it was because it became sluggish to adjust.
I don’t have to count bubbles! I find it hard to believe you used a ph probe and found it more difficult then a drop checker. Perhaps you had low of a kh which causes ph to swing quickly and can make things a bit touchy.

Yes the ph swing is not a problem for fish and plants but too much or too little co2 is. Get your co2 too high and fish will gasp or suffocate. Get it too low and your not benefitting your plants. I feel having a C02 concentration that swings between 37ppm and 23ppm (aka 6.5 and 6.7 ph with 4 kh) automatically at all times is better then guessing based on color and bubble count. I have done both and this just works better for me. Look at Amanos chart in the latest AFA catalog. You will see how much co2 varies throughout the day with your method. I bet the method I would be a much flatter graph.
I keep my co2 a little higher then 30 to compensate for possible meter error (however rare it might be) and as long as my fish aren’t gasping I know I’ve got more then enough Co2. My drop checker will confirm this. I still don’t have to count bubbles! I have yet to see KH fluctuation between weekly water changes. 7.5ml of baking soda in one of my water bottles during a water change and I always have a Kh of 4.
Also Milwaukee and pinpoint may want to debate you on ph controller accuracy but I don’t.

I too have created a few beautiful scapes with strictly RO and I am not saying strictly RO is bad. I'm just saying I am getting better results from my plants and experiencing less touchiness in my water parameters by boosting the KH and Gh slightly. 3-4 is not a high KH but it is enough to give me much less ph swing and a higher ph which I wanted. Ro is usually less then 1 KH this is much lower then i think you would ever find in nature. Tap waer can be over 10. Mine is 15 or more.

I have a planted nano with cherry’s and CRS that I do absolutely nothing too except strictly ro water changes. No ferts of any kind or co2. It does great. I have an assortment of things in there from java fern, crypt, riccia, 4 types of moss, a few types of Anubis. All plants need are enough light, oxygen exchange, and some source of nutrients to grow and be beautiful. A herd of shrimp seems to provide the nutrients needed. That tank has a kh of less then 1 but it does not use co2 or get ferts so i don’t have to worry about rapid water parameter fluctuation. The elevated KH is to keep parameters more stable in the high tech tank.

Try raising you KH to just 2 and I bet your tanks will do better and your ph swings will be much less. I said nothing about nutrients. I am just about to set up an EI PMDD system with a peristaltic pump so I think we can agree here. My "Kh of 2 being better for CO2 absorption" is not an assumption at all. It was told to me by a fellow fish keeper who has been doing saltwater and planted tanks for longer then I have been alive! This guy really really knows his stuff.

Yes. By no means did I intend your method is wrong and mine is right. Amano uses a method like yours. However I don’t think you can possibly say that a method like I use sets me up for some disorder that yours does not. Tom is brilliant for sure but I don’t think he would ever say that my method does not work or that a drop checker is a better method then a ph controller drop checker combo. I can think of at least 4 faults to both methods as well as 50 human possible human errors related to each.
EI and co2 management are different things. Yes one does depend on the other but the amount of ferts depends on the amount of co2 not the other way around. Both methods of adding co2 give good results but a ph controller is just more constant and you can’t debate this because it is fact.
When it comes down to it I think you just really want your “new” method to be better then when you used a ph probe. I assume you may have had problems with your ph probe method because you are using a lot of buffers or something. I t works fantastic for me. Look at the links in my sig and you can see proof. I had a habit of taking pictures right after I re-scaped rather then once things grew in but I’m breaking that habit now.

 

TY Johnny for the clarification ant the tank complement. Honestly i had not idea 1 or less KH water existed in the wild.

Would diffusing into a filter that uses a spray bar be considered a good way to c02 mist?

By the way I aimed my spray bars up more (i have 2 because i have 2 filters). and now I'm getting the same pearling results as if i had the air stone on. I like it much better this way though since the air stone is actually pretty noisy (i like a silent tank). I'm still using a lot more co2 though due to increased oxygen exchange. I guess I'll have to compromise.