Aeration - micro Bubbles Good or Bad

[Wellsted]

I’ve just installed an Eheim aeration nozzle to my water outlet. I does a fantastic job of injecting air and making small waves on the surface. However, I notice that the entire tank is filled with tiny micro bubbles dancing around. The fish don’t seem to mind.

Are these any foreseeable issues with this?

What about the plants?

I do also add CO2 during the light hours.

Appreciate your guidance.

Thanks

[Colin_T]

Hi and welcome to the forum

It is pointless having aeration and using carbon dioxide (CO2) at the same time because the aeration drives out the excess CO2 and you are simply wasting your money and pumping CO2 into the air.

If you use CO2, you need lots of nutrients and lots of light. If you don't have these 3 things balanced, there is no point using the CO2.

There is plenty of CO2 in an aquarium and it's produced continuously by the fish and bacteria. CO2 also gets into the aquarium water via the surface. Unless your tank is full of fast growing plants and only has a few small fish, or no fish, there is no need to add supplemental carbon dioxide.

If you do use CO2, make sure you have at least 100ppm of carbonate hardness in the water to stop the pH dropping suddenly.

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Fine bubbles are bad for fish. If there are lots of tiny bubbles in the water, they can get onto the fish's gills, under the skin, around the eyes and right through the fish. Very fine/ small bubbles are bad for fish.

[Andy Sager]

I agree with Colin, you are working with forces that are against each other. The purpose of aeration is to increase the exchange of gases which will reduce the CO2 in the water.

You definitely want to reduce the micro bubbles. As Colin stated, they can do much more harm to the fish than good.

[Caliban07]

Whilst it sounds intuitive to say that injecting co2 and using a bubbler is pointless, there was a thread on a planted tank forum where they specifically measured co2 levels in conjunction with a bubbler. What happened was that co2 levels rose but plateau’d at a higher co2 base level. It was deemed both a safety net for the fish whilst providing elevated levels of co2 in the realms of what is usually required for high tech tank. It was even coined a ‘method’ title. Perfectly doable

[Joe_D]

Fact is, fish emit C02 through their gills as al oxygen breathing animals do with lungs, etc
So you already have a C02 source.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by Caliban07

Whilst it sounds intuitive to say that injecting co2 and using a bubbler is pointless, there was a thread on a planted tank forum where they specifically measured co2 levels in conjunction with a bubbler. What happened was that co2 levels rose but plateau’d at a higher co2 base level. It was deemed both a safety net for the fish whilst providing elevated levels of co2 in the realms of what is usually required for high tech tank. It was even coined a ‘method’ title. Perfectly doable

In this thread you mentioned, are there fish involved as well? The debate here would be the micro bubbles. These are not good in fish holding tanks. They have been known to cause pop-eye, GBD and conditions in the bloodstream that effect blood flow.

While I agree that using a bubbler and injecting CO2 can be done together, the amount of the bubbling needs to be adjusted to not create an over abundance of gas exchange. No? That a bubbler is creating microbubbles in quantity sounds like the air flow is too strong. ( Just a guess of course since we are not seeing an actual video of the entire tank. )

[Caliban07]

Originally Posted by Andy Sager

In this thread you mentioned, are there fish involved as well? The debate here would be the micro bubbles. These are not good in fish holding tanks. They have been known to cause pop-eye, GBD and conditions in the bloodstream that effect blood flow.



While I agree that using a bubbler and injecting CO2 can be done together, the amount of the bubbling needs to be adjusted to not create an over abundance of gas exchange. No? That a bubbler is creating microbubbles in quantity sounds like the air flow is too strong. ( Just a guess of course since we are not seeing an actual video of the entire tank. )

I can’t recall, I’m trying to locate the actual thread. Think it was more of an article to be honest.

With regards to the micro bubbles my reply wasn’t to address those. I don’t know much about bubbles and fish but I can’t imagine it does any good. It’s certainly not a natural look so I will take your information with regards to them and their effects on fish on board.

My reply was merely to address the effectiveness of using co2 in conjunction with an airstone. If I recall, you increase the co2 to compensate for the out gassing. If the co2 can’t outgas quicker than it is being produced there will be a rise in co2 represented by a graphical curve which levels out eventually.

Think of it like blowing a balloon up with a small hole in it. You can blow the balloon up to a certain size before any more gas will escape at the same rate it is coming in due to pressure thus, the balloon expands but only gets to a certain size.

The article writer was measuring practically so I trust his observations in this case.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by Caliban07

I can’t recall, I’m trying to locate the actual thread. Think it was more of an article to be honest.

With regards to the micro bubbles my reply wasn’t to address those. I don’t know much about bubbles and fish but I can’t imagine it does any good. It’s certainly not a natural look so I will take your information with regards to them and their effects on fish on board.

My reply was merely to address the effectiveness of using co2 in conjunction with an airstone. If I recall, you increase the co2 to compensate for the out gassing. If the co2 can’t outgas quicker than it is being produced there will be a rise in co2 represented by a graphical curve which levels out eventually.

Think of it like blowing a balloon up with a small hole in it. You can blow the balloon up to a certain size before any more gas will escape at the same rate it is coming in due to pressure thus, the balloon expands but only gets to a certain size.

The article writer was measuring practically so I trust his observations in this case.

I understand. It's tough when there are live fish involved. Some just won't wait until things level off. We need to take everything into consideration. It's not the easiest to get all the parts working correctly if we don't.

[Wellsted]

Thanks everyone for your responses. You all make perfect sense and consensus. Appreciated.

Basically there is enough CO2 without needing to inject… but if you at worst you are wasting money and at best there is no benefit.

I will adjust the injector to negate the micro bubbles.

Thanks again.

[Wellsted]

Thank you Colin

This makes perfect sense. Appreciated.

Basically there is enough CO2 without needing to inject… but if you at worst you are wasting money and at best there is no benefit.

I will adjust the injector to negate the micro bubbles.

Thanks again.

[Wellsted]

Will do. Thank you.

[Wellsted]

That’s what I thought. I always felt, whether correctly or not, that the co2 was a bit of a scam. So little is absorbed by injecting in any case.

[Wellsted]

Andy. You are correct. I’m over aerating. Will reduce.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by Wellsted

Andy. You are correct. I’m over aerating. Will reduce.

[Caliban07]

Found the article on aeration in conjunction with co2…finally!

https://www.2hraquarist.com/blogs/ch...-of-co2-safely

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by Caliban07

Found the article on aeration in conjunction with co2…finally!

https://www.2hraquarist.com/blogs/ch...-of-co2-safely

Interesting article. Basically, it's all about the bubbles. ( gas exchange)

[Caliban07]

Originally Posted by Andy Sager

Interesting article. Basically, it's all about the bubbles. ( gas exchange)

Aeration In conjunction with co2 yes.

[Andy Sager]

Originally Posted by Caliban07

Aeration In conjunction with co2 yes.

[Colin_T]

The main issues I have with the article is you need to put more CO2 into the aquarium and have the air bubbles at the right amount. If you don't have enough air bubbles, you kill the fish. You also waste a lot more CO2 because more of it gets forced out of the water by the aeration.

If people want to try this set up, they are welcome to do it but I would suggest removing the fish before you try and make sure everything is stable for a month or more before adding fish. And you need to make sure nothing can go wrong with the air bubbles.

Personally, I think there is enough CO2 in the air we breath and in the average aquarium and adding more is not needed or wanted. In a heavily planted tank with no fish or only a small number of small fish, aquarium plant owners might want to add supplemental CO2, but in an average aquarium I don't think it's necessary and quite often leads to health issues for the fish.

[Caliban07]

Originally Posted by Colin_T

The main issues I have with the article is you need to put more CO2 into the aquarium and have the air bubbles at the right amount. If you don't have enough air bubbles, you kill the fish. You also waste a lot more CO2 because more of it gets forced out of the water by the aeration.

If people want to try this set up, they are welcome to do it but I would suggest removing the fish before you try and make sure everything is stable for a month or more before adding fish. And you need to make sure nothing can go wrong with the air bubbles.

Personally, I think there is enough CO2 in the air we breath and in the average aquarium and adding more is not needed or wanted. In a heavily planted tank with no fish or only a small number of small fish, aquarium plant owners might want to add supplemental CO2, but in an average aquarium I don't think it's necessary and quite often leads to health issues for the fish.

Colin, in this hobby we need to base our understanding on science and evidence and not beliefs. It’s ok to believe that something is the way it is as long as you are open to the possibility of that belief being wrong.

For example, it is not correct to say that co2 in aquariums leads to health issues unless this has been fundamentally proven. I have already shared articles from Tropica showing co2 levels in natural water ways to be above what we would typically achieve with aeration alone. So it’s impossible to say that the gas, carbon dioxide added to those same levels in an aquarium cause health issues. If that were true, wild fish in those regions would be unhealthy or die out or move to another region.

So we can automatically rule out the hypotheses that carbon dioxide above baseline levels affects the health of fish. There is a line obviously and the risk factors do go up when using co2 so you right to be cautious. Take the fish out as you say and dial the co2 in.

The article was written by a top level aquascaper and was shared on was a well respected planted tank forum. This is a completely different audience and is perfectly relevant. Ok, you need more co2 and you waste more co2 but co2 to these guys is inexpensive and the aeration is on point.

To say co2 is not needed is false because it depends on the goal. You can’t grow certain species of plants without adding more co2.

I practice old school methods. I like
to keep things as stable possible but I know that there are millions of people out there having successful aquariums performing all kinds of methods and techniques. Rarely do any of these techniques define an aquarium but they all do have something in common.