CO2

[iMac]

Well after looking at you guy shrimp tank set up, i am in the mood to strat my shrimping hobby!!!!! One question do I really need CO2 to grow the moss and other water plants? cheers

[Robert]

Hi,
no, you don't always need extra CO2 to grow nice plants and especially mosses. What you need is a stable tank at first. In the beginning fast growing stem plants are really an advantage to compete with algae. But most stem plants, except for downois, grow fast and so they need lots of CO2 as a carbon source.
In an aged, stable tank you can even use a sponge filter and your mosses will grow, free of algae. It really works. The trick is to provide only low light, very low bioload and lots of plants like mosses, javafern or Anubias sp. . My breeding tanks are planted like this. They are aglae-free so to say because there are no visible algae, even the walls are free of algae.
Use only very little fertilizer, low light, lots of algae-eating animals like shrimps and snails e.g. Neritrina sp. and use slow growing plants. Under these conditions there won't be much plant growth at all but also very few till no algae, which means it is a really low maintenance tank.
If you get BBA, it's a sign that CO2 is missing and there is no balance of light, introduced nutrients and the uptake of them by the plants. CO2 injection helps best in this case but for a long time solution, reduce the amount of light (1Watt (PL tube) or 2 Watt (FL tube) per gallon are enough for a 1ft tank, more light would mean more plant growth and a need for extra CO2 or algae will be a problem) and the amount of bioload. Add only little fertilizer, these slow growing plants do not need much of it.

best regards

Robert