Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

You can buy the tests seperately.... and they contain a test tube...

Couple of places... and have a look on eBay as well...

http://www.theaquariumshop.com.au/shopd ... at=Ammonia

http://www.thereefshop.com.au/index.php ... cts_id=950

How high are you pumping fc?

The optima's are for pumping to a fair hight, the jebao tornados do very well at a lower height, with much less power.

My fish tank is higher than the grow beds. So the height is minimal. I'll have to look at a jebao tornados....do they pump solids okay? I am going to harvest a few fish tomorrow and see what they weigh. I want to check that they look healthy...plus I wouldn't mind tasting one or two

Jebao do 8mm 'solids' have not had a problem with them yet, currently 3 of them running in my system.

Quick update. Yesterday we harvested two trout. 24 cm - 160grams: 25cm - 190grams. I hope they get to a good harvest size. They were extremely tasty I still haven't had a chance to check out the pumps....another job to do. The water is starting to look a bit clearer. I think the ph coming back up has helped enormously.

Not much has changed with the system over the last few weeks. The ph has come back up and varies between 6.4 and 6.6. I am still adding a few tablespoons of ecorose a couple of times a week to keep the ph up. The shellgrit does not seem to be working that effectively. How much shell grit would a 2000L system need?

I am still concerned about the quality of the water. I tested the other day and the ammonia is still sitting on .25, nitrite - trace, nitrate - 20. The water has no visability. When you look in you can only see about 20cm and there looks like there is lots of floating 'bits' in the water...very small particles. I currently have around 72 trout...around 25cm...under 200grams each. I am feeding half a cup morning and night. When I scrap the bottom with a fine net I don't pick up much 'muck'. Am I overstocked? Should I harvest some fish?

What is going wrong? My water tests don't seem that bad, but the visability is terrible. The tank is covered with a foam floating raft and a shade cloth at the front. There is a ring about 15 cm around the tank that is exposed to sunlight. I have been feeding them a cup a day for the last few months. I am thinking that I need to start increasing this because the fish are so much bigger but am worried about the water quality.

I am still unsure if my pump is working well enough. I timed the fill up time of the beds (500litres) is around 4 minutes and then they overflow for 11minutes. I am thinking that that turn over is appropriate. Do I need a new pump so it fills quicker and turns over a greater amount?

I am going away for the long weekend and are wondering if I should just not feed them for the three days and see what happens....or maybe feed them 1/2 Cup on Sunday just to give them a little bit.

Does anyone have any ideas? Suggestions? At least they are still feeding well and seem healthy.

Well I spoke too soon. I found one dead fish floating on the surface. It appeared normal - gills a normal colour. There was no pellets of food inside it. I think I will not feed them this weekend at all and see what happens. Does anyone have any ideas about what is going wrong?

Without the time to red the entire thread, are you providing dissolved oxygen to the fish? It can be in the form of air stones or water splashing back into the tank.

I have air stones in the tank plus return water from the sump. I don't think air is the problem.

Regards feeding. how long do you spend watching them eat and feed.

Only feed enough for them to consume while it falls through the water coloumn. There should not be any feed on the bottom of the tank.

If your low pH is continual, the Trout will excrete excess slime as a defensive mechanism for protection. This excess slime easily dissolves into the water and its is pretty much Ammonia based protein.

Give your fish as much as air as you can to help de-stress fish and give you nitro bacteria a good breath of fresh air.

When I feed the fish I sprinkle the pellets on the surface - about a 1/4Cup at a time. When that is consumed I add some more. They only take around a minute to eat all of the food. They feed quickly. I am fairly sure all the food is consumed.

So what is your Solids Removal system?

A growbed or two/three... it's called aquaponics...

the toilet, sorry, had to join Rupert on that one, wait, this is starting to sound bad

FC,

If you are filling a 500 liter gb in 4 minutes I would say you are pumping at about 500 liters per 12 minutes, maybe 600 total for the 15 minutes. Might this be too little pumping? Rule of thumb is to pump the volume of ft each hour and this is esp important with trout. I see you originally had three growbeds, so if you fill all three as described above that would probably be fine. Still, if it drains well in 30 minutes, perhaps a 45 minute cycle(15fill+30drain) rather than 60 minute would give more filtration...

Do the solids tend to migrate toward the pump through a swirling action of the water? If not, it will take a whole lot more pumping to collect them and will require a lot more O2 to help the trout cope, I think.

PH: The surface area of the shell grit is key to the reaction which is why a shell flour would tend to act very much faster (dangerously fast, perhaps). You can also get more action by adding more shell. I have no numbers, but would suggest trying five to ten times the amt of shell you have already added. NOTE: I am NOT suggesting shell flour: shell grit (crushed shell) is far gentler, but will take a lot more to be effective. Grit will also last far longer.

Good luck.