Many of the forum members may not accept this but this a reality from my experience.
Yes you can maintain about 15 - 25 ppm co2 without adding any means of Co2 supplementation.
I'm living in Kerala. As the natural ponds having a lot of co2 similarly our well water is having good amount of co2. As said earlier you people may not accept this statement but it is true. Whenever I do a 60 or above water change I can see the co2 indicator turning from dark blue to light green even without adding any co2. If I managed to keep the water stagnant it will remain greener. And if I do some surface agitations it will gradually turns to blue.
I think people in Kerala residing at Kottayam district or Western parts of Kerala (maybe whole Kerala) they don't need to add any extra co2 instead keep a 30 percent water change every 4 days or so without surface agitation. I don't know about well water in other places in India or worldwide but our well water is really a Co2 source. It's redsoil at the topmost layer here and below 3 feet or so it's laterite and when go to deep it's like non molten marble stone like soil.
After a lot of surface agitation now my indicator is blue. Maybe at next water change I can prove this.
I must preserve this co2 source lol
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Just to check... did you mix tank water with your Co2 indicator solution? Or did you use 4dkh reference solution to mix?
If you used tank water to mix, then the color results may be inaccurate due to the existing buffers in the tank water (based on the pH/KH relationship). Hence its possible the indicator color could change to green even if Co2 is not at 30ppm.
No. The system is perfect. This is not the first time this happens. Well water in some areas contains high co2 concentrations. Now my indicator is blue after strong agitations for 24 hours.
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I've read about acidic well water before... those with low mineral content and high dissolved Co2, usually due to a possible mix of acid rainfall, pollutants or decomposition. I guess certain natural ground compositions could also generate those water conditions too.
Didn't know that the Co2 levels could be high enough to show up on drop checker measurements though. That's an interesting observation. Thanks for sharing.
Today I made a 75 percent water change. See the drop checker.
Before wc
After wc
Now it's yellow
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Just curious, with Co2 injection systems we can regulate the Co2 levels by adjusting and tuning the bps rate and timing precisely to ensure consistent daily optimal levels which benefit plants while still being safe for livestock.
In your case using the Co2 enriched well water, how do you achieve this consistency? I notice you do water change every 4 days to boost up the Co2 levels, and the Co2 levels will then drop after the plant use them. So i assume there would be a spike and then lull in Co2 levels until the next water change. Any issues with pest algae that tend to thrive on inconsistent Co2 level environments?
Btw, these types of alternative Co2 sources remind me of a segment i read in Takashi Amano's Nature Aquarium World Book One where he discovered how Co2 can boost plant growth and photosynthesis. In the early days before high-tech Co2 injection systems, he experimented with dry ice and even adding carbonated soda water into his planted tanks... check out the anecdote from his book:
"I decided to make a real effort to raise water plants and design beautiful waterscapes in 1977. At that time there were no power filters and such devices like there are today, and figuring out my first set-up was difficult. I placed about 7cm of fine coral sand on the bottom and intensely aerated the water with a bottom filter. I thought that putting fishes in would cause problems, so I limited myself to plants. For lighting the 60cm tank I used two 20watt bulbs: in a week they were transparent. There were no books to help me out. All I could do was grope on in the dark.
Next I realized that while I could raise plants fairly successfully in old aquaria, the newer ones were just no good. While pondering the reason for this, I figured out that it wasn't just air but CO2 that they needed, so I asked my mentor, Professor Nagashima of Niigata Seiryo Women's Junior College, about methods for carbonation of aquarium water. He told me that 0,03% CO2 in the air should be enough, and that it was naturally absorbed into the water so that I didn't have to add it artificially. But he introduced me to a friend in the medical equipment field anyway, who discussed possible carbonation methods with me and gave me a cost estimate.
It's too bad it couldn't have been done more inexpensively or I would have successfully set up an aquatic plant aquarium much sooner. Carbon dioxide was something I never needed in my work and it was too expensive a material for me, anyway. Dry ice was economical, but it was too hard to handle and disappeared too quickly to be practical. Frustrated, I went on struggling and tried to forget about CO2. The aquatic plant aquarium work inched along to the point where the plants weren't dying as much but they wouldn't form new buds. Then one night I went to a bar with a friend and a clear bottle of carbonated water caught my eye. The label said, "water, carbon dioxide, sodium chloride (NaCl) 1%." I wasn't sure about the NaCl but it was the perfect material for testing whether the plants needed CO2. I took five bottles home with me.
The tank for the experiment was big: 240x60x60cm. Flushed with drink and excitement, I poured the five bottles in. Within five minutes air bubbles had formed on the leaves: they did need the CO2. Every tank I added the soda water to did well, but I had to be careful not to add too much because of the 1% NaCl, and so I changed the water faithfully every week. There were piles of empty soda water bottles all over my room. If I hadn't discovered that carbonated water when I did, I surely would have given up on the whole idea of aquatic plant aquaria." - Takashi Amano
Looks like you have found a natural source of carbonated water for your tank too!
Actually after I stopped co2 injection I have lot of algae. I'm preserving it for algae eaters that I'm going to buy soon.
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