Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Well, the system is going pretty well. I had some initial losses from really low pH. Lost 16 fish. I still have several - seems around 20ish. I don't know how that worked, I had half a dozen minnows, bought 25 bluegill, lost 16 fish, and have around 20. I think that they didn't count the bluegill very closely.

My nitrites are fairly low (just above starting to show), and my nitrates are between 20 and 40. pH is stabilized, I initially put some plants in that were in Jiffy 7 peat pots. They didn't do very well. I think that they got wet feet. On Monday, I bought some more plants, and washed the dirt off the roots before planting them. They are all seeming to do well. There was a pepper that my boys broke the stem off on (hanging on by a thread), I buried the plant, roots, and the break in the rocks, and hoped that it would recover. It's still a little wilty, but hasn't died yet.

The Stevia I put in on Mother's Day had a stem that broke off. I shoved that in the GB, and it has managed to stay alive. (The Stevia with roots has doubled in size and is way outstripping the dirt garden Stevia.

I'll see about getting some pictures.

what has your pH stabilized at? Have the ammonia readings gone to 0?

I don't have an ammonia test kit now. But I cycled with humonia for a month. I've got marble chips in the tank, so that gives some CaCO3 to stabilize the pH. My testing equipment is a little sketchy at the moment. I have a pH tester for my swimming pool that shows 6.8-7.4 as the pH, my pond test kit shows somewhere above 7, and the aquarium test strips show between 6.8 and 7.4, but they are not as reliable. Short answer, the pH is neutral, (when I first put my new Bluegill in, I started losing fish - a total of 16 and I checked with the test strips and it showed as a pH of 6 or lower - after some immediate baking soda, it was 7.something, and the fish stopped dying. Since then, I have checked it fairly regularly.)

for other factors, I just have the 6-way test strips showing around .25 of Nitrite, and around 40 Nitrate. then they show stable hardness, etc.

The FT is partially shaded, and so it is not building up algae, and the water is clear. The fish are hungry, and I am feeding them now more than once per day (it's really cool to watch them).

With the "marble chips"... I wouldn't be surprised if your pH was more like 7.6...

That was the idea - to buffer the system, but when I put the fish in, it had gone wayyyy acid.