# natural light



## Steve001 (Feb 26, 2011)

If the tank receives direct light all day you may or may not. If only for part of the time you may not or may. My tank receives direct sunlight for a few hours during the very late Summer > ending sometime in Spring. I don't have a problem. One way to combat algae is to plant heavily. 
Example 

You'll be injecting co2 right. That's not a question.


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## Bunfoo (Jan 14, 2012)

I have my 10g& 20g near a window that gets about ~2 direct sunlight on one half. I haven't had any algae problems in these tanks so far but in my 5.5g that gets NO sunlight at all has constant algae explosions (my light is probably too high. I am in the process of reducing it).


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## zherico (Mar 19, 2009)

Bunfoo said:


> gets about ~2 direct sunlight on one half. .


Sorry, but I don't know what that means :/, would you mind expanding a little please?


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## zherico (Mar 19, 2009)

Steve001, beautiful growth! How long has your tank been running, cause those bolbitis leaves are huge, and thats one of the slowest grows plants I think I've have tried. I will have one tank with pressure injection and another w/ out. I was also of thinking of setting up extremely low tec, small tanks, like 10 and 5.5's with really nothing but moss and crypts, etc. to see how they do with only sunlight as a source.


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## Steve001 (Feb 26, 2011)

zherico said:


> Steve001, beautiful growth! How long has your tank been running, cause those bolbitis leaves are huge, and thats one of the slowest grows plants I think I've have tried. I will have one tank with pressure injection and another w/ out. I was also of thinking of setting up extremely low tec, small tanks, like 10 and 5.5's with really nothing but moss and crypts, etc. to see how they do with only sunlight as a source.


Since about 1986 or close to it. 
In the short term a tank exposed to direct sunlight will work, over time not likely to work well at all. Next to light for photosynthesis a steady source of carbon can't be neglected. In such small volumes of water the available dissolved co2 will exhaust quickly forcing plants to find carbon from bi-carbonate this is where the trouble starts. Using bi-carbonate and carbonates is a more energy intensive process for plants. Equivalent to a human running a marathon without first loading up on a sufficient amount of carbohydrates to run marathon. It takes more energy to break apart a bi-carbonate or carbonate leading to a net loss whereas co2 does not.
I think you'll need a source of easily utilized carbon for all your tanks even if some of the tanks don't receive direct sunlight.


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