Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Ok what carbon will do from the label of the product,
Supports beneficial bacteria colonies
Removes chlorine smoke and aerosol spray contaminants,
I did not know you had an indoor system,

Have you checked your KH Buffer? Optimum is 4, there is a you tube 5 part that goes through this PH and KH, at the aquaponics source by Silvia Bernstein

Your PH is fine but it can change up and down during the day if you don’t have a buffer, big swings will cause fish deaths, I was off looking up reasons for your fish loss, this is basic stuff everyone should watch, its in my interest to find solutions for your problems now for when they may or may not occur to my system,

I hope this will be more helpful to you,

Thank you so much. Watching videos now.

So I watched that video - apparently with a kh of 180, that translates to about 10 where the videos recommend 4. Will keep trying to raise the PH a bit though.

Ok what carbon will do from the label of the product,
Supports beneficial bacteria colonies
Removes chlorine smoke and aerosol spray contaminants,
I did not know you had an indoor system,

Have you checked your KH Buffer? Optimum is 4, there is a you tube 5 part that goes through this PH and KH, at the aquaponics source by Silvia Bernstein

Your PH is fine but it can change up and down during the day if you don’t have a buffer, big swings will cause fish deaths, I was off looking up reasons for your fish loss, this is basic stuff everyone should watch, its in my interest to find solutions for your problems now for when they may or may not occur to my system,

I hope this will be more helpful to you,

quick question on adding salt - i have a refractometer on its way, but wont arrive before Monday or Tuesday. Knowing that I have not added any salt since my last water change, if i add salt now, and it takes it to somewhere between 2PPT and 5PPT am i likely to damage anything (not growing strawberries)

From what I am reading, up to 5PPT should be still safe for the fish, but some confirmation would be great.

That will be fine.

Have not yet added salt, it is dissolving in a bucket in the house, however looking at the fish,none seem to be exhibiting any distressed behavior. Can be viewed in any video player that can stream - http://willeat.me/fishcam.asx

No deaths for a few days. So far, ive added carbonate buffer to the water, increased the PH to 6.9 and water hardness to closer to 240.
Additionally added salt to somewhere between 2 - 5 ppt. Will test exact level when my salinity tester arrives hopefully Monday or tuesday.

Fish seem more into their food the past few days. Maybe the buffer has helped, maybe the salt, or maybe its just my hoping so

Once again, thanks all for the assistance, and will post updates over the next while. Fishcam is still up as per the link above - open it in VLC or similar, still trying to get it to work in flash or html5. Best results during australian daylight hours.