Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

humonia now will be ok, bacteria would prefer a higher ph, if it gets much below 6.5 you will need to bring the ph back up.

Thanks Ozzie...Those 4 cups of coffee were really makin' me sweat

Correction....Source pond water tested at 7.6 PH or the highest my kit would register. Tea in the system is now brewing . Also the Everglades wild tomatoes I started the other day in another seperate container have begun to sprout.

http://groups.msn.com/Aquaponics/shoebox.msnw?Page=4

Its probably over 7.6 then.

Progress....Well I went and splurged last night and spent 4 bucks on 15 small goldfish to add to the system. Never seen fish look happier darting, dashing, in and out of the PVC pipe all around the stock tank in a little school. Got up this mornin' and all still alive . Amonia level holding at 1.0.... PH holding at 7.2. No trace of Nitrates or Nitrites yet. Added a little shell substrate in a plastic mesh basket to bring PH up a tad. The water still has a light tea color from the coco peat. Installed a hinged PETG plastic cover for the tank. I felt this was necessary because the cat has already been checking this new thing on the patio out (little foot prints in the gravel). I felt this may be a health issue for the cat if he were to fall in and particularly for me due to the fact that my wife really love's this cat. The only hold up so far has been the original timer which was defective. I took it back and it was replaced with no questions asked.

I did have to install a couple of temporary dead men to support the weight of the gravel under the grow bed as it was sagging just a bit from the weight. I'll install a two additional permanent 4 X 4 posts on both sides and a 2 X 6 running under the middle length of the grow bed to solve that problem. The object in the middle of the dead men is a surface mounted light over the fish tank. I couldn't resist putting in a couple of tomato and basil cuttings. They do not seem to be affected by the transplant at all. Not that there are any nutrients for them to take up just yet...I'm just the impatient type. To any pro's out there...Am I on the right track and do I need to change anything ?

http://groups.msn.com/Aquaponics/shoebox.msnw?Page=Last

Looks like you are doing very well. Don't add any more humonnia or other ammonia sources now that you have fish. Wait till you start seeing the ammonia level drop and nitrite level start to show, then you might be able to start feeding your fish a little. Keep an eye on the levels, the Nitrite spike is often a little longer lasting. pH of 7.2 is really good. You might consider a little salt in the system to help the fish through the Nitrite spike.
For now you probably just need to be patient and keep testing to see when the readings start changing.

I like the cat cover. Now the cat can sit there watching the fish.

Is it simple table salt that your talking about? And how much for 130 gallons?

Thanx

use non-iodised salt for fish sytems

Dave59
1 ppt is 1kg in 1,000 litres...or 2.2lbs in 264 gallons

3ppt is 6.6lbs in 265 gallons, so how much water have you in your sytem???

....to continue

130 gals you need ~3.3lbs

Much appreciated BYAP folks.....Still waiting on that Nitrite spike.

OK...Nitrites showed up today exactly 7 days after starting the system up (.25) . How long after do the nitrates start to show (no readings this morning)? When should I plant seeds?

Thanx

You could plant seeds any time since most seedlings are fine with little/no nutrients right at first. This way as nutrients start to show, you should have some plants getting ready to need them.

I've used water softener salt in my system Just making sure to get the plain cheap sun/wind dried sea salt with no anti caking additives. It is much cheaper than table salt but it is also a bit more difficult to weigh out and definitely more difficult to dissolve. You definitely should dissolve it before adding it into your system.

Potassium chloride would also probably work fine to deal with nitrite toxicity but I'm not sure the appropriate amounts to use (it is actually the chloride ion that helps deal with nitrite toxicity) the potassium chloride would have the benefit of providing some extra potassium to the system but again, I'm not sure what would be the best source or how much would need to be used.

It's been a couple months or more since I've posted on this first system. Things are really taking off now that the fish have grown substantially from 1 inch (30 mm) to a few of them now that are the size of my hand. ( see here pages 4 and 5 http://groups.msn.com/Aquaponics/shoebox.msnw?Page=5 ) It seems that the volume of water was too great for the little goldfish to produce enough nitrates to do the plants much good. Very slow plant growth but very happy fish. But now that they are much bigger, and water tests show nitrates, I'm seeing an explosion of growth. I have not lost a single fish of the original 40 (must be doing something right, knock on wood).

Believe it or not, this system only recieves about 4 hours of direct sunlight in the morning due to an overhead eave. I feed the fish a diet of spinach, worms, bananas, flake food and pellets. The tea colored water never went away from the coco peat but dosen't seem to hurt anything. Veggies include Broccoli, swiss chard, radish, tomatoes, everglades tomatoes (flowering), salad greens. More pik's in a few weeks.....