Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Do you remember what the pH and water temps were when you had the algael growth TCL... as opposed to what they are now?

The algae that comes out of the filters. Any use for that gunk. I was pouring the cleaning water from the filters into the pot plants nearby. Or if I dry it out can it be reintroduced. Thought I read something about dead algae stopping new algae.

Oops, I guess I missed the questions on this thread.

I remember algae growth really early in my system on the waterfall. I can't say for certain what the water temps were then. Probably low to mid 70s but that is only guessing as I've not been tracking or logging such things very well.

pH in my system is always 7.6 unless I've just added a huge amount of top up water from the well in which case the pH could be a little higher. The pH range here is 7.6 for the system because of all the washed shells, the well water will appear to be 7 immediately coming out of the tap but is really about 8 once it outgasses.

oop gotta run.........

I used to culture algae, and may again. It can be a good friend and not something to fight. If you have tilapia, they can filter feed off of it. If you can't keep tilapia, there is a cool creature called a rotifer that can, and fish fry love to eat them. Same goes for daphnia.

Some organic tilapia growers feed manure to their ponds to encourage algae blooms. They port the algae through the tilapia ponds, and they don't need to feed them anything else!

If you want to learn about algae, try to grow it, not kill it. It is harder to sustain an algae population than to kill it. Give it constant nutrients, CO2 and light, and constantly thin it. Without thinning it it kills itself. It litterally overcrowds itself and smothers. Once the die-off happens it pretty much wipes out the rest. Either that or opportunistic bugs swoop in and wipe it out. The natural process is boom/bust cycle.

I read somewhere that some commercial operations have used that "gunk" as a soil additive for terraponics.

Also found this:
http://www.sargentwelch.com/search.asp? ... 1226632940

You can purchase algae cultures of specific algae. Let the mad science begin!!!

You think if you took some of the pea-soup.... well algae-soup I suppose.... and laid it in a shallow pan to evaporate the water.... and algae died off.... and then re-introduced it.......... that the heterotroph bacteria would be active and start reversing the algae bloom problem? Would these bacteria be in the water waiting for the dead algae to feed off of? Must the algae die in the water to get them going?

In Kalgoorllie the temperature has recently changed from cold to warm - and all the algae growing on the walls of my tank has died (or maybe eaten by the silvers?)- turning my water all murky

I am hoping that the algae starts to grow soon. Does a good job of trapping suspended dirt.

now i thought this made some interesting reading on algae.....

http://www.nuglobalnrg.com/greennrg.html

I just read the article in the first post. Now I wonder, if the dead Algae in the discussion are the same as the gunk in the grow beds that is filtered from the water, What happens to it if you put a bunch of Red Wigglers in the grow beds and they clean up the gunk? Does that remove the heterotroph bacteria and the antibiotic effect.? I realize that the water changes removes the antibiotic effect at about 75% water changed.

Also if you have bio filter in your system and clean it out then you get another bloom which should be short lived while the bacteria rebuild the equilibrium. He also wrote that the water would have a brown tinge for a few days longer. Any comments?

Now we have two bacteria cycles in the System to learn and discuss and use to make our systems better.

If I remove the cover from my FT will I now get a short bloom and then clear water pretty soon or not? I desire to run my system without a cover on the fish tank but have it partially covered all the time now to reduce the algae bloom.

Also this is another reason to teach people to do fish less cycling to get the proper bio setup in the water and grow beds. So I would teach that you should setup the system and fill it with water and plants, then dose it heavy to cause the Ammonia spike and the Algae bloom and wait till it clears and tests like it should be cycled then add fish. Then you only need covers to keep the fish in not the light out.

Who has experience with how long it would take to complete the heterotroph bacteria cycle? After reading the article I had the feeling it would be about the same time frame as the NitrIte cycle.

Any further progress on this subject since it was last posted in 2009?

In nutrient rich water, some algae is going to grow when light hits. But surface algae doesn't seem to be a big problem.
I've still continued to keep most direct sun shaded from my fish tanks though since it isn't just algae that can be a problem. Full direct sun on fish tank can really heat it up and a cover that lets full sun in will probably also let more debris into the tank than I like in my outdoor systems where leaves are always falling.

I read some of this article, but, I'll have to go back and read it another time. No time now, but, I want a pea soup color in my pond and so do my fish. It is what they eat. I have Tilapia, top teem. They lay sideways and eat it, up side down and eat it and any other position they can get in. They clean the pipes and walls of the pond. I put feed out twice a day because my water is still clear but they ignore the food until they clean up the algae. My friend Steve has two ponds, one Tilapia and the other Catfish. Both are pea soup and that is all the feed the fish get. I eat fish from his pond and enjoy it. No bad taste or problems. If you saw what fish really eat in the wild you might wish they would eat more algae.

Algae bloom management is the basis of all pond based aquaculture Johnra...

But it is difficult to maintain and manage in small volume RAS/AP systems...caused diurnal oxygen and pH swings... and as such, and considering that we feed high protein pellet feeds regularly... we try to avoid any algae in AP... as they also do in RAS...

Algae bloom management is the basis of all pond based aquaculture Johnra...

Sorry I cannot agree. If you said that algae bloom management was the basis of CHIFT PIST or similar systems I could agree. I know of many pea soup green ponds that feed AP GB's and they do fine. CHIFT PIST is a good system, however, it is not the only way.

Virtually nobody deliberately practicses "algae bloom management" in aquaponics Johnra... regardless of style/methodology...

Many people might go through a "pea green soup" phase during cycling... but steps are taken to kill off the algae and prevent any return...

Sorry, but other than some trials done by UVI, and a couple of other people/groups.. using DWC raft systems... nobody deliberately practices "greenwater" methodologies...

The tank volumes.. and inherent pH, DO and temperature swings... just make the management almost impossible... and the risk of failure and fish kills astronomically high...