Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I have used Nepean river pebbles as my media and although I washed them before putting them in the GB the system is now cycling and the water is very dirty, a yellow clay look to the water. You can not see the bottom of the tank and it is only 600mm deep. Will the clay filter out through the GB or should I change out the water a few times?

give it some time, it should settle. If not put an old towel or cloth nappy under the flow to catch the silt

+1....a couple of socks are good too, and change them regularly

BK, stay on topic: personal hygiene is important, but what about the clay? *grin*

Seriously, anything suspended will probably quickly get taken up in the growbed, esp when bacterial slime forms. For now, added cloth filter will help. Feel free to vacuum/siphon out what settles to the FT bottom.

Yep, no matter how well you wash any media, the water will cloud when you put in a new grow bed, this is pretty normal. Now a brand new system that has not yet cycled, will take quite a while for the fine silt to settle and for the bio-slime to grab it up and clear your water. All suggestions about socks or towels etc are good for helping things clear a little faster. I wouldn't worry about changing water at this point in time unless you need to show off some prize koi or something. Get started on cycling and things should clear in time.

I noticed that once my big system was cycled, I could add a new bed with only scanty washing of the gravel and the water would cloud in the system but then it would clear much more quickly since there were already cycled beds online with a good bio-slime amount to help with the filtering.

The system has now cleared and did it over night, 3 weeks couldnt see the bottom and the over night it cleared.
Things are on it way.