Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Like Rupe says about as far up north as you can get in wet old Darwin town.

We have had over 250ml of rain in the last 24 hours, my fish tank has certainly had a change of water its crystal clear now, I am thinking with such a large influx of rain water it may have put me back to square 1 as far as the cycling process goes, my readings have all gone back to 0 in the period of 24 hours.

Question should I give it a little dose of seasol or just start to feed the fish again and watch the levels?

Where abouts is Whickam?


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Stop watching your fish guys and consult a WA map

Gr8 system Upnorth. Are the catfish that are pests up your way OK to eat?

... You wont find Darwin on a WA map though...

Cant tell you no one eats them they always get thrown back, to many quality table fish to be had here.

Today's readings after another day of monsoon rain
Am I right in assuming that after the rain stops I will be going through the cycling process from scratch and if so will this happen every year when we get this rain fall coming into the system?


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Took some more tests today, now the rain has stopped things look like they are starting change, the ph has jumped up from around 7 to around 8 and the ammonia is starting to climb with the other 2 pretty close to 0.
Also the FT water is starting to show signs of a slight green tinge, was crystal clear with all the rain water.



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I took some more readings yesterday and it looks like the ph is going off the chart for some
reason



Don't know what that's all about and tank is having another bout of green alge type bloom maybe that has something to do with it?


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Hi There,
I found this thread cos I'm asking about high pH.
But to keep on topic :
The extra rain water shouldn't affect your cycling / cycled status. That status is based on the the growth of beneficial bacteria in your system. The bacteria grows on surfaces in your system with the most in and on the GB media. So the rainwater shouldn't affect the bacteria. If you were to change the GB media then you would need to start cycling over again.

Your FT cover looks very space age. What is it? Looks cool!

Have you tested the pH of rainwater? We have acid rain here and the pH is around 5-6. So I'm pleased we are having rain here as my pH is at 8.
Looking at your test results would suggest your rain is alkaline. And the other levels dropping to zero is to be expected as the rain water will dilute them all.

P

UpNorth - make sure you're not contaminating your pH vial in any shape or form. A small amount of contamination can make a big difference in pH. Also, if you have it, check the pH using the standard pH tester, and the high pH tester to find out where the pH is at.

Also - rainwater will NOT dilute your nitrates/nitrites a lot unless you have an absolute flood, plus your fish tank would have to be relatively empty. To calculate the volume of a cylinder:

pi * half the diameter of your fish tank, squared * height

In real world terms - if you have 25mm of rain (1 inch) and say your fish tank is 2.2 metres in diameter:

3.1415296535 * 1.1m * 1.1m * 0.025m (convert all measurements to metres to get cubic volume)
= 0.095m3
* by 1000 to get litres = 95L of rain.

I know your fish tank has tapered sides, so this is a ROUGH calculation of the volume, but you can see that 1 inch of rain in (for argument's sake) 950L of water, is only a 10% water addition. Your nitrates/nitrites/ammonia will dilute by an insignificant amount via this method.

+ the catchment from growbeds

Yep + the catchment from the growbeds, which may take it up to maybe 15-30% additional water. I'd say it's more likely the nitrifying bacteria doing their work rather than any dilution factor! That's a good thing.

Haven't had an up date for a while, things are starting to grow we'll. Have added another 20 fish so now have 28 Barra and very close to harvesting my first cherry tomatoes.
Will post photo when I work it out?

G'day mate, thank you for showing myself and my mate your system when I was up their recently. Just starting to get material together to build here but it will only be a small system. Simple reason that the good wife wants to return with in the next 12/16 months. So any bargain buys in Adelaide Riverlet me know. If not before will give you a call at Christmas. Cheers

Photo's Northy....photo's

Hey northy how's it going, has the cooler weather helped the plant growth. May be back up in a month will pm you. Starting to get bits for my system together. Cheers