Killing snails(eggs) with Cabornated water? Carbonated water for quarantine plants?

Soda Water, Why Yes, Thank-You


Hi,

A little while back I took a close look at sanitizing methods and efficiencies,1 somewhere around here I blathered on to no particular interest.


Dipping or soaking in a 20-ppm Potassium permanganate solution for 3-20 minutes depending on the plant, is in my opinion the best combination of cost, safety and efficiency to sanitize most plants.[SUP]1[/SUP]


Carbon dioxide is interesting and more effective than I had imagined.[SUP]1&2[/SUP]

Carbonated water is interesting and I have been working with dosing aquaria with essentially soda water.


For practical purposes consider soda water to contain 1.5-grams of carbon dioxide per liter[SUP]3[/SUP] after being opened.[SUP]4[/SUP] That means that adding 50-milliliters of soda water will add about 30-ppm of CO[SUB]2[/SUB] to your water, that should, assuming reasonable circulation result, in around 33-ppm CO[SUB]2[/SUB].



Dosing CO[SUB]2[/SUB] this way is efficient and dangerous, it is very easy to overdose CO[SUB]2[/SUB], aquarium water and soda water is as “they” say “miscible solutions.


The best way I have found is to pump or place the soda water deep in the tank, soda water is heavier than freshwater so it tends to sink anyway, but never underestimate the power of Fick’s laws[SUP]5[/SUP] here.


How much you need to continually dose is a function of CO[SUB]2[/SUB] use and gas exchange.



Biollante
[SUP]1[/SUP]Nothing in this post should be considered scientific or anything but the incoherent ramblings of a ridiculous old potted-plant. I try to be reasonably sure that it is factual that it does not conflict with what recognized experts understand. At the same time this is not a scientific paper, it is one hobbyist speaking to other hobbyists.
[SUP]2[/SUP]In no way am I suggesting that observation has any place in problem solving or science
[SUP]3[/SUP]At 1 atmosphere (101.3 kPa) and 25C
[SUP]4[/SUP]CRC Handbook of Chemistry & Physics, 86[SUP]th[/SUP] Edition.
[SUP]5[/SUP]Many Guru’s apparently harbor ill will toward Adolf Fick, I do not know why.

 

does this mean if we have 30ppm of co2 concentration in the water, we should not have any snails?

 

Mult-Part question Multi-Part Answer

Hi,

No.:gw

Biollante

 

Soda Water Doesn't Make A Very Good Sanitizer


Hi,

My apologies, I didn’t mean to be snotty.

Some less-than-stable-members of this forum suggested CO[SUB]2[/SUB] and soda water for use as sanitizing agent. So messing about[SUP]1[/SUP] I used soda water at various strengths and found that beginning somewhere around 150-ppm some detrimental effects to some infusoria, rotifers, copepods, daphnia and some small invertebrates occurred.[SUP]2[/SUP]

I found that soda water at half to full strength (680 to 1370-ppm[SUP]3[/SUP]) was reasonably effective, snails fell like rain, after 7-25 minutes the snails appeared dead they were definitely out of the plants. The snails had a near 100% recovery. Snail eggs were undamaged. It also seemed to kill off the, infusoria, but also seemed to recover. Bacterial cultures indicated quick bounce back as well.

We found that 12 to 24 hours in a Ziploc bag was the most effective, however most of the snail eggs survived.

As a side note the plants in sealed Ziploc bags exposed to high light produce a lot of oxygen.

Overall I think soda water for sanitizing plants is less effective than just rinsing the plants thoroughly under a running tap.

Biollante
[SUP]1[/SUP]Nothing in this post should be considered scientific or anything but the incoherent ramblings of a ridiculous old potted-plant. I try to be reasonably sure that it is factual that it does not conflict with what recognized experts understand. At the same time this is not a scientific paper, it is one hobbyist speaking to other hobbyists.
[SUP]2[/SUP]In no way am I suggesting that observation has any place in problem solving or science
[SUP]3[/SUP]At 1 atmospheres (101.3 kPa) and 25C my CRC Handbook of Chemistry & Physics, 86[SUP]th[/SUP] Edition says that full strength would be 1500-ppm CO[SUB]2[/SUB] and half strength would be 750-ppm CO[SUB]2[/SUB], though due to altitude and whether conditions I measured the actual CO[SUB]2[/SUB] concentrations and took the mean as 1370 and 680-ppm respectively. One of the poor souls I duped into assisting me (BigFlusher) found approximately the same via titration and being a smarty-pants, did the solubility calculations and found us pretty close to the predicted value.

 

Just out of interest, what is the hatred towards snails in ones aquarium? I've lost count of the number of threads that I have read over the years asking how to exterminate snails.

Off the top of my head I have at least 4-5 species of snails living harmoniously in my tank. I enjoy their 'company' and enjoy watching them go about doing there thing. I have never seen the slightest damage caused by any of them to any plant.

 

The Snails Ate My Plants...And Gave Me An STD, Honest, Honey


Hi Jim,

You are a man after my own heart, I enjoy the snails. In fact I consider all these little critters, some just passing through to be the bonus in our hobby.



At the same time I believe prudence requires that we protect our collections, investments, our display tanks and the easiest way to do that is with a rigorous system of sterilizing, quarantining, or sanitizing everything that goes into our systems. Also when the unstable among us suggest something, I cannot help trying it out. My experience has been that much that passes for wisdom in this hobby are just the same tired things repeated by the next tired group of people trying to sound wise. It is why I like this site so much even though the Guru team disapprove.


Among the bonuses of the sterilizing/quarantining/ sanitizing regimen are all the extra critters and plants we find along the way, to me it is a regular treasure hunt.


There are in fact only a few real nasty’s, the vast majority of snails and other small critters perform vital functions.

Dare I say I even appreciate the algae? I do dare… I do enjoy them, in most cases they are just trying to make a living; they are there in response to some need.


In fact in my messing about[SUP]1[/SUP], I have found that many of the so-called problem critters actually allow us to keep higher bio-loads, specifically more critters, because they are so efficient in breaking down wastes and providing better habitat for the really small critters, the true heroes of our systems.


My best guess as to why snails are so hated has to do with the fact they “bloom” in response to worsening conditions, rather than accept responsibility for deteriorating conditions in their tanks and working to correct them, it is easier to blame the snail “infestation.”

• I figure most of these folks graduated from “the dog ate my homework,” to “the snails ate my plants and screwed up my water conditions and gave me algae and a STD, honest, honey.”

I have raised snails for the last 30 years or so, primarily as a food source for some other critters and frankly they thrive in conditions that we would consider less than optimum.

I also culture various algae, until a year or two ago principally for food for critters or filtration, in the last couple of years, more to try to understand them[SUP]2[/SUP]. Many alga are actually kind of hard to grow, when you are trying.:gw



In general if you do not want (non-sand dwelling) snails, keep your Redox potentials above 340 mV or so. (Redox is a portmanteau of Reduction/Oxidation.)


Biollante
[SUP]1[/SUP]Nothing in this post should be considered scientific or anything but the incoherent ramblings of a ridiculous old potted-plant. I try to be reasonably sure that it is factual that it does not conflict with what recognized experts understand. At the same time this is not a scientific paper, it is one hobbyist speaking to other hobbyists.
[SUP]2[/SUP]In no way am I suggesting that observation has any place in problem solving or science