Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Tojo,
I suggest using the full testing kits, the ones with the tubes and test drops. MUCH more accurate than the strips and MUCH less expensive, per test, too. Glad to hear your mom is coming around! Once she gets a taste of the lettuce she planted, she'll be hooked too!

Di,
Are you on a well or city source for your water? There should be like 0 ammonia in your tap water! If you're on a well, it must be leaching in from some local source. How long are you letting the water sit out before you add it to your system?

if it's city water.. when chloromines break down, one of the byproducts is ammonia..

Steve (and Keith),
Not to hijack Tojo's thread... it is city water and I just now started my system up. I filled my fish tank not knowing that the ammonia was coming from my tap water. I was letting it run through constant flow for a few days before I added anything (plants or fish). I got fish but took them out and separated them to their own tank away from the system and I planted some plants a few days ago. I have a thread here...

viewtopic.php?f=11&t=12518

Any more pics of the system since your mom painted the GB's, Tojo?

Tomorrow some new photos, I have very little time on my hand and am also planning a system expansion (of course, who isn't?)
I still have that third IBC on my hands and a few round winemaking tanks, so these will probably be used in some way.

In the meantime I'm also trying to make it look decent/prettier/pretty/while still being very useful.

I'm still looking for a decent water test kit (in the meantime, the system is being run on a cupfull of pure ammonia).

I was thinking of buying a few mosquitofish just for the sake of it, or maybe a few goldfish. (say, two or three)

We've also been having a lot of rain and I'm not sure whether that is a good thing or a bad thing??

It basically filled my FT to the brim and since I haven't yet installed a "rain overflow" it's all there... But I've been reading that people are trying to prevent rain from entering the system... why's that?

Tojo

Rain, especially run-off can contain nasties picked up from such things as galvanised shed roofs, dirty tiles, alkaline tiles etc. This contamination can be harmful to fish and/or unbalance the water.

If your system is full to the brim and you've got a cover over the FT you cannot have floating pots at they will pressed hard against the cover, if you don't have a cover it is too easy for fish to jump out compared to if you have some ullage/freeboard in the FT.

If you've got a nicely balanced system, then you might not want pure rain water coming in to dilute your system. It's OK to dilute ammonia and nitrites, but it also dilutes your nitrates, salt, or any other beneficial additives in your system.


Scott

The rain wouldn't be run-off, at least.
The thing that really bothers me is that thhere is no way I can realistically prevent rain from getting into the system (mainly via the growbeds, that act like two huge rain-catching devices).

The FT is full to the brim only if the pump is turned off btw.

Thanks for the input Scott!

Even if the rain goes directly into your system from the clouds, Tojo, it will contain more then just H2O. Different types of pollen depending on the time of year, dust particles and other polutants depending on severity and other factors, may be trapped as the rain drops fall through air that contains them. All these would end up in your system little by little. The grow bed will filter some out but chemical polutants would likely remain in the water. To say these are a problem for you, no one really can say for sure without air quality and other types of testing. Which would be expensive and quite unnecessary for your sized system. The key is, knowing they may be there and understanding they would upset the balance.

And of course, anytime you add water, it will change your concentration levels for possibly everything. Heck, even adding perfectly pure H2O it will upset the balance in your pH unless it is already 7.0 exactly!

Thanks for the reply Steve.

Some thoughts: what you are correctly stating, though, applies to everything we eat (were I to have a "regular" garden, which I still have, my veggies are still exposed to the same rain) so the only solution I can see at present time is doing a partial water change after heavy rains and disposing of the surplus water in the rest of the garden.

Which is what, I think, most people do...?

You certainly would want to dispose of the excess water after each rain. Using it on your soil garden is just fine as the soil will filter out dust and pollen. What I have mentioned really is only a big concern, in my opinion, if you are in a large city with poor air quality. If your location is more rural or small town, these would be of VERY little concern. Really the biggest concern I think would be the pollen and dust ending up in your FT and needing to be cleaned out after a number of times it would rain. I say these thing strickly from what my knowledge of biological and ecological systems. My systems are indoors so I do not deal with any of these issues personally. Those who have to deal with rain in their systems may tell you something else?

Not sure you would need to do a water change out after every rain. But rather test the water to see what has occurred. Changing out the water could cause your system to go further out of balance it has established.

But that's just my not-so-humble opinion.

I don't worry about doing water change after rain -- seems like a waste of water, especially after you've just received a load of free water.

I empty some water from the FT because I have a couple of floating pots. I take about 50-100L in watering cans and water any plants that didn't get affected by (sufficient) rain. When I move and expand my system, I shall cut an overflow in the FT to automagically divert the excess to nearby dirt gardens, or possibly even dump it to a soakwell? (I don't want to be cutting holes in the FT until we move it to its final location; measure twice, cut once.)

I let rain pour into my Gb's all the time.

That is exactly what I wanted to hear Charlie! thanks!

Anyway, @steve, I live outside the city but relatively close to a highway (also very close to the sea), but we have the strongest wind in the world which the experts list as one of the reasons our air is so clean.

All my systems are, and always have been.. totally exposed to the elements Tojo....

And we get some pretty strong winds around here.. let me tell you...

By the sea and away from any cities, those issues I mentioned would be negligible if even that. After seeing the resposes, I thought, "I'm such an idiot!" Rain is an important part of the water cycle in any ecosystem!

@Rupert, I love your fish icon above the bird. Do you use it because it also looks like a DNA molecule?
I tend to think you did, based on what I've read of your posts here and in Sylvia's forums.