Too much CO2 mist?

I'd rule this one out.

Going back to Steve, George and my wet dry issues from the 1990's, these are huge issues. Neither of us saw any movement of pH till we fiddled with each: the overflows and air into the dry part. Overflow alone accounted for most of the losses, but depending on the seal and level in the sump, the dry part could make a large difference.

I tried a dozen modifications so I could use those filter socks they use for reefs, but even using a degassing regasser tube, still at 10-15 bubbles a second on a tank that should be about 4-5 bubbles a second tops, could not keep up.

So I am installing a CPR wet dry today
Removed the sump and berlin style system.
Back to basic methods.

If I want more mechanical, a post canister would take care of that, or have an independent canister loop filter etc.

Some species will melt, unless you do 2-3x a week 50-70% water changes for the first 4-8 weeks, even then..........some do.

ADA will depress the pH, typically 5.5-5.8 are normal.
You might just eye ball the plants and fish.

You can blow out the water by doing a 80% water change back to back, then measure the KH/pH. Most of the KH will be accurate as will pH and less effect on tannins. Adding activated carbon will help the tannins. So a little of both can get things pretty good. Riccia is a good indicator for pearling.

Go 10 hours. Mg dosing?
I'd dose pretty good from here on.
NO3, K+, PO4, Traces, GH...........

Then the rest is CO2.

Regards,
Tom Barr

 

That makes two of us.
But new stuff needs tested and tried.
I'm pretty much done at this point though.

The sump with a traditional wet/dry chamber works best it seems to me.
That's what I use to use. Hardly needs cleaning and the load from planted tanks is a lot, too much for most of the filter socks for many tanks.

Those are great, that's all I use.
But I have a wet/dry chamber where water first comes in and I plug the holes up with duct tape.

Client's tanks are similar.

Most of the plants should do fine, otherwise it's a CO2 issue.

Well, there's few other reasons why the tank would not be doing well with plants other than nutrients and CO2, the nutrients are easy to rule out via dosing and water changes(which you have been doing anyhow).

So that leaves just CO2.
Careful with the pH though and ADA AS, it messes with pH.

I've honestly never found any relationship with nutrients and activated carbon, the carbon is more specific to large ions and organics, not these small nutrients.

The light is more based on what plants will use, you can see many closing up towards the 7-9 hour range. I'd run the lights low first then high and then low then off. Then repeat etc. Maybe 4 hours total max light midday.
The T5's are very bright, more than you think.

If you have ample biomass, then you can dose pretty rich nutrients, try 1/2 EI.
You can split it into daily dosing also, add to liquid etc, make similar to 2.5X PMDD but keep the Traces out and dose those separate and add the PO4 as well to the macro nutrient solution.

I'd suggest trying the GH booster, it's about 1/2 K2SO4, 1/4 Mg and 1/4 Ca and a little Mn/Fe for good measure. Sort of a one stop cure all for the rest besides NPK and Traces.

Alan sells it, so do others, sort of like DIY pre made SeaChem Equilbrium.

No, not unless fish are stressed. Usign less light is how you do this, you do not start in the middle or the end to control nutrients or CO2 demand, you start with light, since light drives all photosynthetic processes.

So more light = more CO2 demand from plants, that in turn drives nutrient nutrient demand. So you have far more wiggle room, resiliency, stability etc, using lower to moderate light vs higher intensities.

This reduces CO2 demand from the plants, thus you have a much wider easier to achieve target for CO2, then the same is true for the nutrients, you can get away with a lot less, more, neglect etc.

It's common sense if you know how a plant grows and what % of it's components come from. Some ignore it and think that their observed correlations means everyone's must be the same.

But then you find counter examples that disprove it, they typically did not measure light and CO2, so all the brew haha over nutrients is really secondary effects, not root causes. That's why I can add loads of nutrients without issues, whereas others may or may not have issues.

ADA lights are very low over all, 30-50micromols along the substrate which is pretty low. I compared the methods and the LiCOR sphere 193 to the apogee many are now starting to use and it was within 5% or less error over 80 cm depths in our columns at the lab.

Good enough for me and cheap.

CO2 is the tricky one.
No good method to measure it that's cheaper than say several hundreds and DIY or 2000-3000$ for a pre made one( ihad one and then installed in a client's tank.
Pretty cool device.

But for 3000$, it better be.

It does not have any issues with pH/KH or any internal water parameters, just the CO2 dissolved and it's response time is about 2-4 minutes.

If you use a water sampling chamber that's sealed, you can withdraw water and avoid the response time entirely and measure down to 100microliter volumes(eg, at the surface of leaf vs 1 cm away etc).

Regards,
Tom Barr