Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Good point DT -another helpful hint is to cover the fish tank if possible - I use shadecloth

Stop changing the water. Add some salt and leave it all alone for a week - it will come good.

Sounds like we've just tried a bit to hard. Need to relax n give the fish some time out eh. Have just finnished salting the water. Couldn't get marine salt as such, could only get sea rock salt. Crushed it up then disolved into a bucket like you said Ell. Will do 1 more thing before I leave them alone and that is to put a cover over half the tank.

Will leave them alone now.

Nice cover

Yes mate, nice cover...and stop playing with the bloody fish

yeah, it's that "P" word again. Leave things alone. By the way, using rainwater can really lower your ph over time. Don't do anything now, just keep that in mind.

Over time, the bio-filter bacteria activity will lower the pH as well. Get a bag of shell grit from a feed store (like they use for chickens so they get enough calcium.) Have the shell grit on hand to put into the system as the pH will eventually start to fall unless your gravel or something else in the system is keeping it up.

Nice thing about shells, they generally self regulate to a pH of 7.6 so you are not risking really drastic pH bouncing unless you let your pH fall way low. I think the trick is to put enough in to help keep your pH around 7 but not so much that you are stuck with a pH of 7.6 for all time.

Thanks people, this is all good info ( certainly a learning game this ap ). We do have a bag of shell grit in there and have done for some time.The fish look good this morning ( there's a peep hole in the cover so I can see fish but they don't see me ! ) thanks guys, hopefully the salts doing it's trick.
My question is if there's a dead fish in there do I need to find it and get it out. ie is that fungus contagious. There is a couple of pipes in there where they can hide.

Try and remove any dead fish, especially seeing that you have a virus infection in the system

Leaving dead fish in the tank = more dead fish later

did a check. Fish a lot jumpier when I lifted the new cover, but no casualties

Got home from work tonight and another 2 dead fish. The water has cleared up crystal clear. Water temp 18 deg. ph 7, amm 0 , nitrate 0 nitrite 0.25 . The dead fish look like healthy dead fish ( if that's possible ). When I had to get the dead fish out the others went mad for a short time. We have'nt been near the tank for a couple of days and the only time today was to get out the dead ones and to test the water.

i'd dose the fish in a seperate tub at 10ppt salt, and make sure you dont have ANY rotting organic matter in the FT..............

for the record i've only ever used table salt (un-iodised)

also, run between 1 and 3 ppt in the main tank