The Importance of Water Flow

What's up Folks? Josh here and I'm excited to talk to you all about how important WATER FLOW IS to YOUR tank!

Water Flow forces the gases in your tank to move around. Nitrogen commonly gets settled at the bottom of a tank. Which is a good thing but, without healthy waterflow, the Nitrogen that settles at the bottom can sometimes outweigh the amount that is being eaten by the Nitrifying Bacteria in your tank. This can cause extensive plant melt at the base of your aquarium.

Another Gas that is important to make sure to circulate is CO2! If you aren't circulating the water in your tank then you aren't pushing the co2 in your tank everywhere it needs to go. Some plants are in heaven and others are gasping for air!

What type of flow you use is everything. Water Flow provides Plant Agitation, which is actually a really good thing. Plant Agitation, Especially in Rhizome plants, can stimulate excessive growth! That being said, when causing agitation. The goal shouldn't be to blow the plant out of the soil. The goal should be to find a healthy amount flow that will ultimately keep the plant rooted in the substrate but causes the plant to feel like it needs to focus on rooting itself deeper into the dirt. Just enough flow to make it move without uprooting it! This is important if you are trying to establish new plants in a tank. This will cause them to put off more leaves and roots quicker. It just takes a little time and patience balancing it!

Water Flow is an important element to consider in your tank! You can buy a jet to put at the bottom and keep on a low setting. The direction you face the fan will stimulate different growth in the plant for certain. Some plants specifically stem plants like lots of water movement on the tops of their stems. This makes sense considering they are usually river plants.

Although, Rhizome plants which typically aren't at the top of your tank really love constant waterflow over their rhizome. This also makes sense considering you can't plant any part of the rhizome ever.

Bulbous plants also like healthy waterflow over their leaves! Much like stem plants they prefer plenty of movement for their leaves!!!

I hope you learned something!!!

TANK ON!