Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

When you say all your testing needs what is "all"?

Which Hach model is it?

Hach DR2800

Yea me too but atm there isnt much reagents for testing.. what I can tell you is that I currently can test for phosphates.. and tomorrow I will be conducting that test for sure from my FT.

Thanks for the link. So its a one time dose?

I have an offline MT tank that has 2 day old poo and and AP water in it, total of about 40 gallons. No air, nothing, just sitting. So do i test for ammonia until it gets up to 8ppm then add air (need to pick up another air pump)? How long with air?

I usually don't add additional carbon reason being.. I my theory I don't want the bacteria to get use to external additions... is the bacteria is getting their carbon from another source other than the fish poo.. it may stand a chance of not breaking down the carbon within the fish poo.. this may lead to solids not digesting properly and even to excess free carbon within solution... a next thing about carbon additions is that they tend to form acids very fast which can lead to you MT water Ph hitting close to pH 6 due to methane production step being the limited step.. cannot keep up with the acid production to facilitate conversion.. when PH falls below 6.5 digestion starts to decrease in efficiency.. normally people may think this is good because now I get the chance to add calcium or potassium... but in adding calcium may result in phosphate binding and precipitation.. also what some people aren't aware of is that anaerobic digestion especially with external carbon source will produce large amounts of carbonates.. I always seem to get high pH after adding air.. I believe bacterial growth promotes alkaline environments.

well this is my brief take on the matter..

how long is the air added for..? untill ammonia and nitrite reaches 0ppm.. one think to note... too much air is actually a bad think in MT.. if u notice when ppm reaches 8 for ammonia as u stir the tank u should see the colour of the solids close to black.. and not the normal light brown.. this is due to iron sulphide formation... so in answering your air amount... just add enough air at the base of the MT to allow for the solids to change from black back to light brown and once you cannot smell the hydrogen sulphide scent.. you got enough air.. at this point just test till nitrite reaches zero.

double post removed

Thanks cookie.

no problem.. keep me posted with the updates.

Looks pretty good. Many of the test ranges seem to be better than the YSI 9500 but the price of the unit is a LOT more.

Cookie,

If water breaks everything except oil down giving enough time. And the Ph from a limestone rock quickly effect a systems water. I have to ask Just how much does the system mineralize the grow media. And will the different grow media (rocks) be more beneficial for the system because of the available minerals inside them. Maybe I am thinkinginto this too much. But it would be nice to know that the system given time would break down the fine rock dust to use the minerals within.

One of the reasons I justify not washing gravel is that the rock dust will be full of essential minerals

Stu,

Thanks that is what I was hoping to hear. Now with that said which rocks would naturally have the best trace elements for our hobby. By the way I have a drum filter question on my thread that you would be the perfect person to answer.

It would depend on what minerals you want.

Limestone would be good for calcium.

I reckon any volcanic rock would be good. The bluestone I used kept the pH stubbornly at around 8 for about 3 seasons of trout. If you take a cup of fresh stone and add vinegar to it it bubbles gently for about 10 minutes and in a couple of days the pH goes from about 4 to 8. I would assume that because whatever is keeping the pH at around 8 hasn't leached out then the other minerals that also leach out over time are still there as well

It is a good theory but sometimes the ability to adjust pH is hampered alot due to the carbonates properties of the rocks.. a while before I try thos said theory and used basel rock or the blue metal stone and for nothing will the pH ever go down.. I my view I will stay away from it completely.. and hence alot of people uses gravel because it is very cheap and stable as well... the funny thing is within the gravel load some one one aremineral rocks are usually mixed in and to me I believe thats the best it can be.. because pH is too important and you ned that ph7 to be able to grow plants great... but if u want to add the limestone rocks.. after you ph starts to fall. just start adding it in then to conteract the fall.. I believe un that way u got a better control of you system.

Umm the RESULTS are in.. man I luv that Hach.. the following photos says the reading of my FT water






So it seems that my mineralization is releasing loads of phosphates from the fish waste.. now to sample MT water after I complete a batch of digestion.. experiments are too fun.