Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I have a new system consisting of two BYAP balcony tanks. Water and plant growth is good but the goldfish I got have a few white spots on them. The fish are eating well and display no signs of streess but rather than let it develop I would like to salt the water.

Problem is I have no idea of working out how much salt to put in the tanks.
I have calculated the volume of water to be 400 lites per tank.
The water temperature is 26 degrees C as we are in the middle of a heat wave so I figure a dose of salt now has a good chance of curing the white spot.

So how much salt per tank (400 lires) and how much do I put in and at what intervals to maintain the salt level?

Sounds like Ich... so you need at least 3ppt.... that's 1.2kg of salt per tank....

Use Sunray pool salt...Bunnings @ $9 a 20kg bag...

Thanks Rupert

I'll do it today - can't do much else with the day temps at 40C.

+1 and keep the water temps up over 28 deg.

Thanks Chainsaw

I dosed the tanks today so hopefully the fish will get some relief soon. The temperature is good at the moment as we are in the middle of a heat wave - 40 degree days.

When and how much should I add next time? I am assuming it breaks down over time.
Also does it take long for the itch to go?

I realise this is fairly subjective due to varying systems and climates but any advise is better than an ignorant guess.

Salt doesn't evaporate and it only gets used very very slowly by plants so you likely don't need to add salt again any time soon unless you do a large water change.

Ich life cycles are definitely tied to temperature so if the water is staying quite warm, your system should hopefully be free of it shortly, definitely in a few weeks.

If you are needing to salt regularly, you will need to get a hydrometer so you can measure the amount of salt in the system before you can figure out how much salt you might need to add.

Thanks

I set my water at 3ppt a year ago.... its still 3ppt now. IMO water changes is the only way to remove it.

A year of top ups should have lowered your salinitiy Charlie...

I would have thought so too. Strangely.. not the case.

I know the basalt from the goldfields quarries lives in hyper-saline environment. Possibly my media is the cause

Same here Charlie. I over salted my system around a year ago and it is still fairly high even with rain water topping up my sump and with me now adding water every week or two due to transpiration/evaporation.

Some source water may also have some amount of salt in it that could keep the salt level in the system from dropping.

There are some people out there who will tell you that you should "never" add salt to a system, I suspect they are in an environment that tends to have salty media and/or source water/or their coral sand they use for pH buffering probably comes with an amount of salt.

Perhaps water loss through transpiration/evaporation does not remove the salt out of the tank where water changes would?

Anway the only way to take the guess work out is for me to get a hydrometer. It's hot already so a trip to a pet shop sounds like a good plan.

Buy an ATC Salinity Refractometer on eBay instead....

Yep. Spot on. This is the only way to remove it.