Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

We know flashing can be caused by a few things, itch, agressive ness etc, but my silvers I think are doing it because they are about to cark it. Have fished one dead one out this morning and one almost dead one out this arvo that was upside down (barra food ) and now more have started doing it. I am doing a water change as I write this. Have gone into HSM.
The problem is, if I change out a heap with rainwater, the ph will drop as rainwater is 6.5. And I have heard that tap water is a no no for silvers, they don't like the chlorine wheras barra say may nolerate it a bit better (mine certainly have).

Any help would be appreciated.

the fish I sacrificed had no spots, no fungus, etc, looked perfectly healthy except for the fact it was 90% dead.

mon I did a 90% water change 3 days in my 3ft indoor tank with tap water and used water conditioner and both my silvers and catfish are doing fine...oh and whats HSM, Ive been meaning to find the right time and thread to ask rofl

are the silvers and the barra in separate tank systems? The barra are healthy right? Is is possible to remove water from the silvers tank, replace it with water from the barra tank, then top up the barra with other water?

or is that a bad idea for some reason I've missed?

Good idea Jaymie, only problem is nitrates in barra tanks are quite high, and I have no plants in the growbed over the silvers.

I just tested my tap water. Damn ph is 6.4 or so. It changes week to week here. Back to a syphon removing water and a gentlwe flow in from the rainwater tank at the other end of the tank. Eventually I will stop the syphon out and allow it to top up.

Silvers want a gh of 200, is the water too clean, search on keeping them specifically as opposed to general aquarium guides or AP guidelines.

Barra might not die from chlorine as in, oops tap water - dead fish, but every time you do that you add to gill damage, tis not advised.

i have tooped up tanks with silver perch (sometimes 40% or so of the total volume) with straight tap water a couple of times with no problems (depends on where you are, and the water but ours shouldn't be too diff)
I didn't use the conditioner, as didnt know what chemicals were in it


As for the silvers, is this the first sign of troubles? Were the dead or dying fish skinny?

If its not too late or any more that die (hopefully no more die) touch their underside, does it feel like their internal organs are liquified or at least softer than it should be, and pull back their operculums and check their gills, do they look normal?

Okay, I will do that. So far both dead ones were not skinny, looked 100% fine, no marks, not red around the gills.
Operculums?

operculum = gill cover

I went and checked on mine (pre-empting HSM) They looked fine, gave them some duckweed, ripped into it

careful mate thats how mine started

Same supplier? LKB has SP problems too at the moment.

Done think so mine came from melbourne dealer

I think Monya and I got fish at the same time and place. LKB's came from somewhere else.

Mine from Ausy fish. I think I have killed them with kindness. Emily LOVES feeding them they are SOOOO cute she says.

F&F, your dramas are very fresh still, I said to Heather last night before any hassles here, I don't know if I would cope as well as F&F has if I lost all my barra.

I feel really cross with myself for letting ammonia get so high. Am running the pump flood then drain then immediate flood again manually to try and help things along as well

How high is high?