Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

It was my system that had the 1000 nitrate. I'm not sure I'd do that to trout, but the tilapia were fine. Now that things are established, I usually have about a 10 nitrate. Today it was 0, so I pulled out the eggplants that weren't doing that well anyway.

no water tests today , I was fighting hangover demons

Ive gone & put 25.5 grams of salt in the tank ( 1500L , = 17ppm )
hope the plants handle it

the salt will hopefully stave off what I think might be a disease problem too :

one trout has definite white patches on the side of its body , it shows up alot when you look at it in the water , but whe n I take the fish out its almost imperceptible . a couple others have slight white patches on the sides when seen swimming , but again , nothing when theyre scooped out

another trout looks as if its got a white layer over its eyes , but when taken out of the water its eyes are a fair bit less bright than all the others , it also swims around slow and doesnt kick too much in the net , the others go crazy when I scoop them out

I had what looked like a fungal disease on 2 of my big goldfish in the other system , that was medicated as soon as they went in and the fins cleared up , but theyve still got white growths over their eyes . Im working on the assumption that its no longer contagious as I put our 2 other goldfish in with them a week later and they have for 3 months now shown no sign of catching whatever it was . My worry is that in transfering some water and gravel from the old system into the trout system , somethings been bought across and this one trout has picked it up

it was too dark to do anything about it last time I scooped it out , but I think tomorrow I might have to practice my filleting . Maybe its just one reterded trout with dull eyes that swims slow . its definitely the same one I keep taking out , theres only one acting like that so maybe if I remove it all will be ok

oh -

and the broad beans in the system are a foot high now . lettuce is coming along good , lots of carrot seedlings popping up

apart from that , not much extra growth on the plants that were already in there

just scored 2 nice big pond pumps off my uncle , got to go pick them up this week . One apparently does a 2 metre head , Im gonna try stick a couple venturis in it and put it at the bottom of the tank with airlines coming up to the surface , that'll add a hell of alot more aeration than even the 1400lph pump Ive got in their squirting through a venturi

I take it I cant over-oxygenate ....

borris the plants will handle 1000ppm no worries at all and is what i'd put in minimum if i was looking at a fungal issue

here comes another 975 grams of salt

had my first death yesterday , only noticed it at midnight when I went out to check - a slight fishy smell , whats that ?

a little trout had gotten overexcited at feeding and jumped out into the gap between the ibc skin and the wood decking ..

the gaps are all filled with plastic shopping bags bunched up , that wont be happenning again . My water must be nicer to swim in that Duckponds - only one fish has jumped out

As to the salt, I had 3 ppt or 3000 ppm salt in my system for a few weeks and the plants seemed ok with that at least for a few weeks. I have since diluted the salt back down below the 500 ppm mark and am planning to do another salt treatment real soon before I get any other fish.

i gave my trout a 30 minute 10PPT bath 18 moths ago to try and cure them of SAP fungus.

no reason you couldn't do this a few at a time in a garbage bin if you wanted to, use system water with an air stone and dose it up

heheh , you havent smelt my garbage bin ....

Im going to try quarantine a couple of them later in the week when I get the new pump / venturi setup , then I can use the existing one in a quarantine tank

problems should be gone pretty dsoon though - Nitrite is back down to 0.25 today , thats a nice big drop from 1 where it was sitting a couple days ago

the salt already seems to have helped the one drowsy looking fish . it still sits near the top of the water , one eye is milky and it cant see out of it , but if it sees me with the other eye , or food, it behaves exactly like the other trout . It also seems to have a little more kick when I scoop it in a net , yesterday it didnt really seem to mind , now it kicks like all the others

might still kill it just to be sure , thats a damn small fillet though , maybe I'll need to make a sandwich out of it or something

salt seems to have worked wonders , all the fish are swimming around happy

Nitrites steady at 0.25
Nitrate up to 40

scored 2 new pumps off my uncle - both submersible pond pumps
one is 1250Lph for 18W , slightly less efficient than the one Ive already got in there for circulation / aeration , but Ive put that in the tank with a makeshift venturi on the outlet , doubled the oxygen going in the water

second pump is a 3400 lph , I put that in the tank but theres way too much circulation , the little fish couldnt swim straight . That one I'll save for the next system , shoot it straight down the 8m length of the long slim tank & let the fish swim against it to get their food hehehe

feeding increased now that I think Im over the nitrite spike

Don't increase your feeding Boris.... your system has barely cycled with your current load.... let it settle for a week...

Then if you feel the need, increase your feed slowly.....a small amount per day... hold that rate for a week or two.... monitor your tests and plant growth...

If you whack a lot of extra feed in straight away the bacteria may not be able to respond quickly enough initially....

You've got plenty of nitrates for plant growth at the moment.....