Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

That'll be good,

I'll pm you,possibly won't be up for a while,but would be good to catch up with you when we do.

Cheers.

Its looking better now after much growbed flushing and draining off of cloudy water. I can see the bottom of the fish tank clearly now
Now I can move on to cycling the system, making fish tank lid and trying to find blue barrels for system expansion.

Put 10 goldfish in the tank from the garden pond yesterday and a good dose of seasol

Day 1 with new water and fish
Ammonia 0.5
PH 6.4
Temp 12C (afternoon)

Wondering why the ph is so low I tested the town water which I filled the sump with 7.0 and the rainwater that I filled the fish tank with 6 or lower
Dunno how rainwater in a plastic tank could get so low

Your system is looking great! Had a similar thing myself lately - the water in my tank is ph 6 or lower as well, a bit of a surprise when i filled the tank from it, but no probs for the fish. Does make me wonder about acid rain though....

Ohhhhhhhhh i wana clean my water now:P

not like theres a shortage of it ) but i dont wana play with stuff again...........

but it could be my reasons for High PH :/ blue metal fines suck..........

Hey Jamie, dont worry about the high ph, it will come down after you put fish in believe me. I am gonna have to find a supplier for bulk shell grit tommorow as my trout system is down to 6 or below again. It started at 8.4 with one bed of blue metal and two beds of white pebbles.

Bonsaibelly, yeah, have no clue on the acid rainwater tank water. I use it for brewing the the beer comes out great. Mashing of grain requires or creates and acid environment for the sugar extraction so starting with acidic water must help
But this is the first time I have tested it. will test again tommorow to see if it was an anomoly

Day 2
Amm 0.5

Day 3
Amm 1.0
Nitrite 0

hey richo hows it all going?

Hi Jamie
Water is cloudy again but not the pea soup that it was. Chucked a couple of egg whites in there with some salt. I want to try to get the water clear so I can see whats happening with the fish.
Added some iron to the system yesterday

Ahhh Nice, my water is seeming to Clear a little, still stained with seasol so it has a nice tint too it but its no longer cloudy.


Good to hear its ticking over

Day 7
Water clearing slowly
amm 1.0
nit 0.25
rates 5
PH 6.6-6.8

Plants doing nothing yet. Have put some worms in the growbeds and because I am trapping the fish poop in the filter wool, added some poop that I have been drawing off the small system in the gb's as well.

Well day whatever and:
Ammonia 0.25
Nitrite 1
Ph 6.6
Plants starting to show signs of life

Ammonia 0.5
Nitrite 1
Nitrates 20
PH 6.4

Noticed quite a few solids on the bottom of the tank now the water has cleared. So I turned off the return valve to the sump and got the whirlpool in the tank happening with the pump on full. 10 mins later took a 20L bucket from the tank sump outlet and got the solids out.

whynchu add some shell grit? Will help with calcium and will buffer that pH up to 7.4 7.6, won't go any higher than that on shell grit :]

Yeah, I will do that Abdul. Got a 20kg bag of shell grit a couple of weeks ago. Its very dirty shell grit though and will need a good washing.
The water is clear now so dont want to muck it up again