SuperColey1;38151 said:
Tom
I was wondering if you ever measured your non CO2 setups with this equipment?
Would be interesting to see the ppms that naturally occur rather than be told 0.5ppm by one person, 3ppm from another and 8ppm by yet another. lol (I obviosuly ignore anyone who suggest 28ppm after using the Ph/KH char
)
AC
No, I did not measure a non CO2 tank.
Natural CO2 levels are extremely varied and likely play a huge role.
Dan Canfiled is recently been interested in this topic and has done some work:
Most researchers are doing status quo stuff, but I think looking at CO2 critically helps to put a much better picture about submersed plants in natural system, since nutrients alone, in the water and in the sediment do not correlation to plant distribution, nor does light really either beyond a certain min amount of each.
So CO2 is the one growth parameter left.
http://fishweb.ifas.ufl.edu/BACHMANN/CO2_FL_lakes.pdf
The average lake was about 10 normal atmospheric pCO2.
But the range was from 0 to 81,000, quite large.
Other issues; sampling was inadequate.
They took one sample at sometime(?) during the day.
To do this right, you'd need to sample several times during the day and have a day profile for a few/several days each month during the growing season, all year etc. They also did not measure non carbonate alkalinity.
Seems to me, they would better off measuring the degassed gas and use an IR CO2 meter.
This would give good results that measure only CO2.
Once the sample is taken and kept sealed, you have all the time to measure it and it can be added to a sealed chamber for further measurement.
Regards,
Tom Barr