1 x Lighting querstion and one CO2 questions

[marchmaxima]

As some of you know, I'm in the middle of a fuishless cycle. My light has been kept off during the cycle. my ammonia has dropped from 4ppm to 2ppm in the last 24 hours.

With the decrease in ammonia, I am almost at the stage where I'm ready to turn the light back on.

I have large leaf hydro that I only bought for the beneficial bacteria, but is looking happy and healthy (to my surprise). I also have 2 anabuis nana that I ordered from an LFS shop. It came in earlier than expected so its now in my tank.

I currently have a single fluroescent light spanning the length of the tank wiht an Aqua-glo bulb. I worked out gives me 1.2 WPG.

Should I turn the light back on yet, and if so, how much light per day should I have? and how many hours should I give it after the cycle is done?

2nd question... Being that the tank is small (2ftx1ftx1ft), I was eventually toying with the idea of setting up the sugar/yeast CO2 injection solution. None of the articles I've found say how often the mixture needs replacing. Anyone know the answer? Just curious.

 

[Purrbox]

Wait until the cycle is done or you'll likely end up with pea soup in the form of green water algae. Ammonia + Light = Green Water. The Anubias will be perfectly fine with just the ambient light in your room for awhile.

Once the cycle is over you'll want your light to be on for 8-12 hours. Longer for growing out plants, less for maintaining your aquarium or fighting algea. With the plants you have so far 8 hours should be plenty. Make sure that you put your lights on a timer so that they are getting a consistant amount of light.

It sounds like you have a 15 gallon aquarium. As such you'd want either two 1 Liter bottles or two 2 liter bottles for DIY CO2. Generally it's recommended that you have a total of 2 liters for a 10 gallon and 4 liters for a 20 gallon, which is why I'm not sure which you'd need. If you could find a couple of 1.5 liter bottles that would be perfect. By using two bottles you can stagger out when you change the mix, and help keep your CO2 levels more steady.

How often you need to change the mix depends on the mix you use. If you're using the basic sugar, water, baking yeast mix then you'll probably changing out on bottle at least once a week. Using a fancier yeast mixes and/or a higher quality yeast (like champagne yeast) can extend that out to changing one bottle every 2-3 weeks. You'll need to pay attention to your CO2 levels, and use that as an indicator to when you need to change out one of the bottles.