Oxygen

[steve]

hiya, looking for some info,
-Do I need anything else apart from the plants to keep the oxygen levels? Are airpumps recommended? I mean I want good levels for newts, plants and bacteria.

 

[jennifer]

Plants produce oxygen in light, but they consume it in the dark. So there has to be some source of oxygen besides plants. Simple diffusion from the air may be enough, depending on the setup. Does the tank in question have a filter that stirs the water around? Does it have a solid cover, or a screen top?

 

[steve]

Hi Jen,
Yes It'has a filter but It's not working all day long, I Switch It on whenever I feel There are enough "ufos" in the water. The cover is a solid plexiglas piece with about 25-30 holes I've drilled.
Yesterday, looking for airpumps, I've found an cool solution. I put a tube with small holes and cuts in the out-flow to diffuse the flow, and I've attached a small tube to it that exits the surface, the flow drag some air and the bubbles exit by the end of the tube.
(Sorry, but I can't explain this accurately, I'll post a photo)

 

[edward]

Hi Steve,
The filter really should be run all of the time as this will allow it to be colonized by bacteria that break down the waste.
Ed

 

[steve]

yes Ed, but I've got plants and gravel and the outside parts of the filter colonized, and the newt doesn't seem to like much the current and the noise, so I switch It on about 2-3 hours a day.
Here are the photos as promised:

the big tube is cutted in it's sides to let the flow exit. the small tube it "just" underwater and attached to the big one. You can't see much bubbles but there they are (It's a camera problem - can't adjust exposition speed - (obturator?)

 

[jennifer]

I agree with Ed that it is better to run the filter all the time. If it runs part-time, the waste goes in and then you get anaerobic decay instead of aerobic decay, which is usually not good for water quality.

Since you are going to have an air pump, I would suggest the following: Remove the filter you now have and attach the air pump to a bubble-driven filter. There are several choices for this: A "box" or "corner" filter, a sponge filter, or a "Small World" or similar type of filter. All of these are pretty cheap. For photos, see:
http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/filters.shtml

 

[edward]

With a filter you get a much more dense and "efficient" biological filter as the food and oxygen are continually replaced while the bacterial waste products are removed.
Oxygen has a very slow diffusion rate in still water (I remember it being something like mm/100 years or some such weird units). While the bacteria colonize the entire inside of the tank the ability of the bacteria to be efficient is hampered by the limited oxygen and food in the immediate water column. With the water movement provided by a filter this is much increased and the entire biological filtration in the entire tank in made more efficient (but the filter is still even more efficient due to the current flow and the surface area that can be colonized). The bacteria are limited in thier colonization of some of the plant surfaces as the plants compete for food and at night respire CO2 which hinders the bacteria's ability to metabolize the ammonia and nitrite (if the local CO2 level is high enough it will even drive ammonification from nitrate) and the low pH near the plants (CO2 -> H2CO3-> H3O + HCO3) will also inhibit the metabolization of ammonia to nitrite to nitrate).
Also what you want for the absorbtion of waste products in the tank are either fast growing plants such as "Elodea" (Elgaria if I remember correctly) as these will have a high need for the waste products and be more inclined to absorb large amounts of them. Sword plants are no where near as fast growing.

Ed

 

[steve]

Let me see if I understood It all

I've got to run the filter non-stop to let the anaerobic bacteria remain over aerobic bacteria.
The filter I have is a sponge filter and it's colonized, I've touched it (haha), I don't want to use the air-pump because i can't regulate the output that it's too much powerful and noisy, and the newt does not seem like this.
I've got a fast growing plant, it's an ambulia sessiliflora (similar to eloidea), It comes from South-East Asia, this goes by something about natural habitat of orientalis, and the newt seem to like it 'cos he's usually there. The ph is about 7.5.

 

[edward]

No the filter should run nonstop so that you have aerobic bacteria over anaerobic bacteria. If you run the sponge filter the aerobic bacteria will colonize not only the surface of the filter but the depths of the sponge. If the filter is not run you run the risk of anaerobic growth in the filter and the resulting release of of byproducts such as hydrogen sulfide which is poisonous to the aquatic animals.
You can purchase for a small amount of money a valve that will control the flow of air from the pump to the filter like these on thatpetplace.com http://www.thatpetplace.com/Products/KW/valves/Class//T1/F03+0291+0033/Itemdy00.aspx
Airpumps are noisy but the sound can be reduced by placing them on a padded surface. (Usually the cheaper the pump is the more noise it produces.
At a pH of 7.5 all most all of the ammonia in the tank will be as the toxic form of ammonia and very little as the relatively nontoxic form of ammonium.
Ambulia is a fast growing plant but it also will secrete a significant amount of CO2 after the lights are off.

Does this help clear up the issue?

Ed

 

[steve]

Yes, now I'm understanding the ammonia cycle, but, next time I'll buy a plastic newt, haha, just a joke, I like this animals so much. Don't mind about learning. Thanks.

 

[jennifer]

Steve, there are many ways to control the output from an air pump. If you want to be cheap and primitive (like me

), you can just partially clamp off the tubing with a binder clip. Regarding noise, I like Rena pumps, they are fairly quiet. There is no way to reduce the bubbling noise from a sponge filter, but if you use a filter with an airstone or diffuser, the bubbling noise is MUCH less annoying.

 

[jesse]

There are also wisper filters. i have one and its totally silent. Works jsut like a power filter, and it only cost me a cool 20 bucks