A little co2 help

[LesPaulPlayer]

Ok so I have my 29 gallon up and running it just needs to be cycled and have co2 a system set up. I am running 130 watts of lighting about 10-12 hours a day. I have a few vals and sags in there now but they don't look to be doing to well. I'm guessing this is because of high light and no Co2? For a 29 gallon moderately planted tank would a DIY co2 system do? As far as diffusers go would a regular pot type one work? With cycling I was just planning on seeding bacteria from a friends tank or buy some of the Bio-Spira stuff. Does it make more sense to cycle before planting or does it matter?
Thanks in advance.

If anyone could recommend a site for co2 equipment that isn't crazy expensive I would be grateful.

edit: Apparently a flipper/ladder style Diffuser is better for DIY because is doesn't need as much pressure... Is this true?

 

[fort384]

The small nano type glass/ceramic diffusers would work just fine. If you have your tank well planted, you can actually do a silent cycle with the tank. That combined with some seed material ought to get you through just fine.

DIY CO2 would be fine. I would recommend cutting the light back to 8-9 hrs a day. Are you dosing ferts? At that high of light, it may become necessary, lest you bottom out on 1 of the essentials. Also, what kind of lighting is it (type of bulb, color temperature? That is a lot of light over a 29, especially for the plants you have. Crossing that 4WPG threshold on a 29g tank pretty much guarantees you will need to add fert to keep things in balance.

aquaticmagic on ebay sells cheap nano glass difussers if you want to go that route. I would recommend you just build your own system using plastic containers and some parts from your LFS rather than blowing 30 bucks on the hagan CO2 system which is woefully undersized for even a 10 gal tank.

The best setup seems to be 2 separate mixture bottles (that you can stagger changes in so your CO2 output stays relatively constant) connected to a gas separator/bubble counter (so you can monitor co2 output and keep floccuated yeast out of your aquarium) and then connected in the tank however you want to diffuse it.

BTW, a limewood airstone will work as a diffuser too if you don't want to drop 10 bucks or more on a ceramic glass diffuser (or wait 3 weeks for shipping...).

 

[LesPaulPlayer]

Thanks, great article. I want to say that the bulbs are 6700 k? but I'm not positive. They are PC lighting in a coralife fixture. I have to go to my LFS and check out if they have any co2 stuff. As for cycling I think I'm going to just use Bio-spira, as interesting as the "silent cycle" seems.

 

[JustOneMore20]

Be careful with the ceramic/glass diffusers with DIY CO2. Sometimes it doesn't have enough pressure to expel the co2 and the top might blow off the bottles...making a mess. I never could get my diffusers to work with DIY, but others have. Limewood airstones work great as fort said. I've used those with alot of success....placed the under the filter output so the bubbles get dispersed.

I recommend cutting back on your light a bit. You could do a burst of lighting where you have all 130 watts on for only 5-7 hours a day instead of the whole 10-12 hours. That is a ton of light to have going for 12 hours and while DIY co2 works, I found it wasn't as great as pressurized when you have that much light over a 29g. I do the lighting bursts on my tanks and they seem to work well and help keep algae down to a minimum. You will be looking at an algae outbreak I think having that much lighting and no co2 (right now).

I'm also wondering if you are fertilizing....if not you should start that. And it would be wise to get more plants as well, if you can. Try to mix some fast growers with your slow growers.

 

[LesPaulPlayer]

Thanks, Yah I have already seen tons of thread algae, but nothing I can't fix. I decided to run the lights less and now I'm looking into ferts. Not really sure which is best. Maybe excel if I don't want any crypts.

 

[JustOneMore20]

Dry ferts last a while, especially on smaller tanks. I would get some KNO3 for nitrates, K2SO4 for potassium, and then use something like Flourish for micro nutrients. Excel is good too, but your Vals won't like it. Fort actually sells some ferts too...liquid kind if you'd rather go that route.

 

[fort384]

With the intensity of the lighting you have, you are most likely going to need to dose more than just excel. Excel is only an organic carbon source, it does not provide any of the other macro elements or trace elements you will need in a high light tank.