Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

My Interest in home gardening taken me into Aquaponics system, I found some video & magzines on net. After watching the videos and reading on Net. I designed the entire system and I grabbed every thing from different-different market places.

Here is my Begining....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GETdinCin_M

First, In this I am trying to achieve the ph level of below 7 but every day the ph jumps like, 7.4, 7.5, 7.6, 7.7, this movement take only 2-4,5 days. I have 48 Fingerlings of Mrigal & Rohu one Gold Fish is also in the team. I started with 52 fish in IBC. But 4 fish died, one by one in 40-45 days. I use to change the water after 4-5 days.

If I use sulfuric Acid or vinegar to bring ph down, like : 2.5 ml in 1 Litter of water. will it work for this system.

I purchased Sea Weed Extract from a good company in Delhi, India. I will use it when I will start placing seedlings in beds.

I did one mistake, I planned floral foam for seedlings, seedlings sprout easily but roots was jammed in floral foam. Now I am planning for other media like small size gravel.

Please reply for Ph level maintenance.


SAM
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Hi Sam, dont worry about the pH, it will drop by itself over time, constantly trying to control it will stress the fish out.

Dont change the water unless the Ammonia or Nitrite get to deadly levels, once again this stresses the fish out, and slows down the cycling process.

I dont know what acid to use for the pH. I wouldnt use any myself.

Hello Sam, welcome!
I think you need to work out why your ph is climbing and then decide if it needs to be addressed.
Test the ph of the water source you have used to fill your fish tank with. This will give you an indication of what the system will have started at.

What is your grow medium? It may have an alkaline componant that is leaching into the water causing the ph to climb.

Algae growth will also cause ph to climb quite quickly.

Also the ph reading in the morning will be quite different to in the afternoon.

Most people seem to suggest do nothing and the ph will drop over time...However be aware that high ph will make small levels of ammonia and nitrite a lot more toxic for the fish than would be the case with a low ph system. Also at high ph plants will perform poorly and not take up nutrients as well.

My system has a concrete fish tank that is tiled.. it had a ph of 8.2 or higher for a long time, and would not go down even after cycling. I added a small dose every two days of Hydrochloric acid (it is used here to adjust ph of swimming pools) mixed with water in a bucket and slowly added to fish tank. I had to keep doing this until the acid neutralised the lime in the tile grout before the ph started to drop. It is now 7.4 and I have stopped adding the acid and am watching to see if it will drop further by it self.

This did not seem to bother the fish, although I only have a small number in a large fish tank. My reasoning... what is more stressfull for fish and plants, too high ph or adjusting it down slowly?

I visited Delhi last year...quite an experience!!

We determined on the other forum that Sam's ph rise was probably due to two factors...

His media is broken up concrete... and his source water is obviously carbonated... and rises in pH after sitting for an hour or two...

Was there a solution on this 'other' forum?

Dear All friends,

First of all Thanks to every one.

The media I am using is concrete, but the main thing is I didn't started the cycling of fish water into grow beds. From tomorrow I am going to start cycling from grow beds.

Now I want to know is for how long the aerator should run in fish tank, I have 48 small Fish and 1000 Ltr (IBC) Tank. I purchased a small compressor for this.


SAM

Always good to leave air pumps on full time. the more Dissolved Oxygen that is in the water when power goes out, the longer the fish stay healthy before trying to suck air on the water surface.



Will the concrete be able to leech limestone (high pH buffer) if that was used in making it? Any gypsum concerns?

Today I found fifth fish dead in fish tank, It really hurts, I don't like this.

One thing I found common in all dead fish and recently added air compressor's air pipe, there is some sticky material which is white and something like glue but very smooth, I can scratch it from the aerator pipes and see some. The dead fish was always coated with some similar thing.



SAM

Sounds like it might be dust from the concrete... not sure how you can fix that without replacing your media ... how well was it cleaned?

Maybe putting some filter material onto your GB outlet pipe would help you find out whether thats what it is... as well as how much of a problem its going to be for you?

Hate to say it, but if it is that... you may just see more fish deaths because the fine particles would be sticking to their gills.

Good luck, and hope your fish losses dont get too bad