Can You Have a Planted Tank Without CO2? Of Course!

[Krandall]

My perspective is different now, but my reasons for avoiding CO2 came from a desire to avoid cost and complexity, and very low expectations for what I was expecting to get out of my first tank. I think it's easy to say "oh, it's not that much" to add CO2 but when everything is new to you and you have to buy everything, it feels like a lot.

I read a lot of people who emphatically discouraged diy CO2, and there was an attitude of "you get what you pay for" in regards to regulators and needle valves that can give the impression that cheaper off the shelf CO2 systems are not worth the money. Then you get into the many decisions about how you are going to get the co2 into the water, how to tune the system correctly, on and on. And this of course comes after you've had to tackle the lights, the substrate, the filter, fertilizers... I would have had a hard time believing that it could me not that expensive or difficult. Like I said, my perspective has changed now, I am more dedicated to the hobby, have more experience, and can navigate all of this. But it didn't seem doable as a beginner.

I think @Yugang is absolutely right about how the messaging online about CO2 was not really beginner friendly, at least at TPT when I was starting out. If I had seen it laid out as above, or was more familiar with people running ~15 ppm CO2 successfully (which, as we've talked about, used to be the norm!) I may have come to different conclusions. I have run across individuals who took a more casual approach to CO2, but they seemed to be in the minority. The perils of groupthink, I suppose, and another reason I love hearing about what people used to do, and less common practices people are following - lots of good stuff to learn from!

A big part of why I wrote my book. Beautiful planted tanks do not HAVE to be super complicated or scary!