High-light photoperiod

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

Sicklid

Aquarium Advice Addict
Joined
Aug 8, 2006
Messages
1,077
Location
Brandon, FL
Anyone have any advice on running a high-light setup for only a few hours in the middle of the regular photo period? On my 2.5g I am running a 13w CF. I am not getting the algae I had when I was running twice that amount... But I am thinking about putting the second ballast/bulb on a separate timer to come on for say, 3-5 hours in the middle of my 10 hour photo period... I am hoping to combat the diatoms I got when I cut back the lighting as well as increase photosynthesis without having a full-time high-light tank and losing control of the algae situation... again!

Or, should I just keep my current wattage, but increase the duration to maybe 12 hours?
 
I run 26-watts over my 3-gallon with no issues. Lights are running 12-hours a day full on. EI ferts and pressurized CO2. LOTS of plants (kinda overflowing). Also have tons of Nerites, MTS and RCS keeping things tidy.

On my 72-gallon I now run an 8-hour blast with 2 hours in the morning and evening at 1/3 lighting for a total of 12-hours. I am not sure if this has really helped anything though...

I wonder if your nutrients are bottoming out... How are you getting CO2 in there?
 
I have seen your tank, and you have way more plants than I do, and they are faster growers too... I am pretty sure that I introduced the algae explosion I experienced via a new bunch of moss and a couple of plants I did not dip first...

As to my DIY c02, I have a little glass nano-diffuser feeding tiny bubbles into my AZOO palm filter, and I was getting incredible amounts of dissolved C02, so much so that I could not keep up with the buffering. I mean, my ph dropped from 7.6 to 6.3 in a matter of a few days... I was planning on addressing the buffering issue with some media of some sort in my filter, but I happened to simultaneously have a huge outbreak of cyano-bacteria and hair algae from the introduced plants. I was trying to maintain a level of nitrates of at least 10 ml/l and phosphates of .1... So then I just did a complete tear down and have tried placing the diffuser in a different spot and cut the lights by half... I am now doing fine as far as keeping the nutrient levels steady, but I guess that is because I am not really getting the plants to take them up as fast due to the lower light (I know the light is too low because of my brown diatom bloom...)

So, now I am hesitant to increase the lighting until I can sort out the buffering issue and get properly prepared to deal with the increased growth. I was successful at getting things to take off... In the short time I had the c02 and high light, all the plants grew like mad.

Now I am trying the C02 diffuser under a "bell", which is keeping a giant bubble of C02 in the path of my filter flow...

Any suggestions?

Just did a test:
PH = 6.8
KH = 9
C02 = around 40ppm?
NO3 = 5 ppm
PHOS = 0.5 ppm
 
Back
Top Bottom