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[APD] Re: lazy methods



"In all my time spent in the great outdoors I've never seen any C02 dosing stations."

Well they are not stations, they are called springs and sediment bacteria as water passed over and through the soil or organic matter. Spring water is very high in CO2 and plant growth is extremely lush in these places. Come to plant fest sometime and see for yourself.
  
"Why is it that we feel that we have to dose CO2 in the home aquarium?"

We don't. Folks like to grow plants better, this allows that. Pearling fast growth excites a lot of folks.

" Surely substrates
in nature can become depleted just like our own. Is it that we just like to see 
plants growing faster? Is it that we constantly remove plant matter from the aquarium?"

Yes and no. Accreation of detritus can easily overload and increase the nutrint content of any body of water, there might be something else limiting the growth such as light/current etc. 

"The "Lazy Ass" Method defined is:
Substrate: Cheap potting soil covered by Home Depot play sand.
Shop Lighting 1W/gallon
Aquaclear filter.
Huge prune once a month, 
Replenish fish feeder once a month
Top up water once a month
scrape algae once a month. 
In total, I probably spend about 15 minutes a month per tank.
Ups: Low maintenance, fish seem to like it, plants grow reasonably well.
Downs: algae has to be addressed, periodically I have to dose specific nutrients
to compensate for any visible plant ailments, mulm builds up on the bottom, but 
it's covered by plants and stays out of the water column.
I'm aware that I'm breaking many rules, but I'm not killing fish, and the tanks 
look good. So while I agree that the "Barr Method" is pretty simple, it
can be more time consuming than my current regime."

Certainly but what you see vs the effort you put into it also a consideration, you might be fine with tanks like this, others want more and nice aquascapes, certain plant species, etc , see non CO2 vs CO2 methods.
There are trade off with each method. The non CO2 method is fun and easy and about as lazy as you can get.
I keep those type of tanks as well.

But if you desire to improve growth, then you will have a trade off, more pruning, more maintanace.
I suggest folks try BOTH methods no matter what direction they are coming from.
If you have 75 tanks like Rhonda, most should be non CO2 tanks. But having one or two CO2 tanks is nice, and if you are all CO2, try a non CO2 tank.

"Spencer"

Regards, 
Tom Barr





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