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Re: Photosynthesis?



> From: "Jennifer Orme Van Buskirk" <jv6a50 at tec_oz.cc.utah.edu>
> 
> I recently received a bunch of plants from mail order, and after a 
> days work, I got them all planted in my 135 gallon aquarium.  My 
> question is, though they look great now, they don't seem to be 
> photosynthesizing.  I have 240 watts of lights, and a sandpoint co2 
> injector, yet a don't see any small bubbles coming from the leaves of 
> any of my plants.  Should I be worried, or is this no big deal, 
> could this be a sign of something bad to come.  Plants- a little bit of 
> everything; swords, crypts, anubias, bunch plants.

I wouldn't panic just yet as I'm sure your plants are photosynthesizing.

It might be that there isn't enough plants yet to super saturate your
water with O2. If you have a lot of filtration of surface disturbance
this will tend to bring the O2 concentration in the tank close to the
partial pressure of O2 in the air. Also more fish would consume more
O2. I'd say be patient and let the bunch plants grow. If you have lots
of these esp. the fast growing ones, they will soon be producing loads
of O2! 135 gallons; I'm so jealous! Is this a fairly new set-up? or do
you have a lot of fish already? If there is a heavy-duty biological
filtration system established supporting a moderate to large fish
population, that will consume a fair amount of O2. Did you also
recently increase the lighting level to 240w? With a high bio-load,
you may get some algae growth. Sometimes I think it's best to use
stem plants or something like Ceratopteris until the algae situation
is stabilized and then switch over to other slower growing plants like
swords & crypts.

If I may be nosey, which city/town do you hail from in Utah? I collect
names and locations for anybody who wants to contact aquatic-plant
enthusiasts in their local area for the purposes of acquiring plants
etc. All you have to do is mention your location in your .sig and I'll
add it thusly:

Steve Pushak      spush at hcsd_hac.com      Vancouver, BC, Canada