Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Well I just don't trust any big organization especially governments, so even if a lesser 3rd world nation you know, like Australia makes a claim about an unsafe food I'll pay attention. I was just playing around, I like to play dumb American sometimes the truth is we are all global weather we want to be or not. And we all have a lot to learn from each other. I'm honestly ready to go spend the $1100 touring all the Aussie AP setups and call it "her honeymoon" earthbound I'm going to need to move into your RV for a week.

Merica hmmm yah!

Oh but the point was that fishmeal is worth reading about and it in all of our fish food and if sustainability is your goal you owe it to yourself to do your own research on where it comes from. On the other hand its chemical make up is literally capable of spontaneous combustion and the chemical I mentioned is added, even in Australia, to the fish food, though not aloud for direct human consumption. Or maybe the point was the fishmeal only comes from oceans and is farmed responsibly in few of those circumstances. I'm still trying to sort it out in my mind, I was hoping someone would say no no no you misunderstood all of that.

I shut everything off to inspect without water flow or air stone bubbles for a moment and I realized dead fingerling are the cause of the drain failure. At this point there are still survivors, I've got it turned back on and watching to see how the survivors manage.

I don't think I'm going to bed any time soon with this is going on. The PH was probably too low for them @ 6.2 I hope the morning inspection wont be as bad as tonight was. I removed 20 KIA out of 60 and I can only count about 20 near the surface at the moment. I turned it back on to see how the drainage works and it seems I'm still having some kind of blockage. I'm guessing more dead and weak fish are getting sucked against it. So I will wait about an hour and shut it all down again to clear the drain and see what the count is.

This is rough... its like the plague over here. We had to plan this on Friday the 13th, that is my scientific answer at the moment.

PS- You have to go "drag"...I refuse. FF- I'm 100% confident the 4 days will be worth the investment. It's real easy to assume that people who "have experience" and some book knowledge have the answers. For me at least, all one needs to do is look at Ryan's outcome to conclude that he is an expert. He produces the best quality plants and fish. He's certainly walking the walk. I've people in all fields, sales, construction, service, auto repair tell me how good they were, but their results indicated otherwise. As they say: "The proof is in the pudding."

damn after all the anticipation you're dealing with this? I'm so sorry. Were you up all night? I guess if you were you're not reading this.

Living in a 3rd world country ain't easy, even a lesser one like Australia.

I'd heard that you Yanks had a stricter food safe list than us.

And yeah gotta watch the pH it sure can get away from you. Good luck sorting out the issues.

Sorry mate, I'm living in it... There's some space to camp under the awning though, the view isn't bad, you can see the dog's stressed about it all.

Lots of things can spontainiously combust. Wet hay being the most obvious. We still feed it to livestock, though we do like to let it dry first.

My Fish Kill - This might make the all time dumb list here at BYAP. I was so focused on maintaining 5ppm ammonia via bottled ammonia doses during fishless cycling and waiting for the nitrite readings to drop to zero. So when we saw the nitrites were being processed we added fish.

Here is the mistake... I didn't wait to allow the ammonia level to drop back to zero before adding the fish which create their own ammonia. Basically I just killed these fish because I was ready to add them the moment that I saw the Nitrite drop off but I continued dosing ammonia to 5ppm out of habbit 24 hours before adding fish so when the were added last night it was about 3-4ppm. That in addition to low ph, being transported and the shock of the flow being turned on and off while we adjusted the drain covers was enough to kill them.

I should never have tested with multiple fish let alone 60 which was already much higher then our stocking goal anyway. I was so proud of my patience through all of this only to blow it the moment fish were involved. Anyway live and learn, at least for me. The fish however, were not available for comment.

In hindsight the number of fish I tested with was an even bigger mistake then what I did with bottled ammonia dosing.
I only needed 1 fish to learn that lesson.

Ron - I learned that myself after some of that reading the other night it seems its the gases given off by decomposing organic matter are usually the cause. Maybe this is why human flatulations are flammable as well? I guess I've always thought of science fiction when I saw the words spontaneous combustion.

EB - The dog makes it even more inviting! Seriously though Eco/Agro Tourism is something I would rather do then the commercialized vacationing. That camper is real freedom!

Coach - I was going to send my better half to take notes with you guys, she is going to be really upset that you would rather hang out with me in drag hahahahaha. I do think that you guys will learn a lot there and I would love to attend its just a big commitment for a hobbyist but not out of the question yet either.

Boss - I stayed up till about 3am and went to bed when there were only about 8 survivors left. Meanwhile I was researching low PH ap systems and talapia requirements. I verified that my PH is within range, although the very low end of the safe range. And its still unusually low and a concern to me but that was when I finally realized I was overlooking my ammonia levels all together.

Thanks for your comments guys I promise to be more responsible with this stuff! My inner buddhist hurts today.

I will respect the fish... and Buddhists... and Australians

i guess you can kill fish "fishless cycling too". I have always done it with fish, just start small and go slow.

Feeling your pain man. Well look at the bright side. Now the wifey has a reason to make another road trip to pick up more fish.

Man, that blows. Sorry for the loss. I'm like Cotton, only used fish to cycle. Hoping for tomorrow with 100 or so goldies. Then after a few weeks and some cycling , we'll add a few hundred tilapia. Going to take it slow and see how things go before raising the stocking rates. I've had nitrites as high as 5 before, but always with a PH close to or over 7, and the fish all survived. Using well water, it's hard for my PH to get below 6.8. If I could, I'd like to be around 6.5, but growth has been solid, and it's more fish forgiving at 7, so, I'm not complaining.

-deleted- oops i posted in the wrong thread, excuse me.

Pond- I saw pictures of the GF, sorry, you don't stand a chance...even if you were to wear your best dress and heels. I'm stupid, but I'm not blind.

If it's any consolation, I went to a Halloween party as a woman once. It wasn't pretty. Something about a 6', 180lbs "woman" with legs shaved to the knees and size 12 flip flops that didn't quite look right. I did win the best costume award...a bottle of Jack Daniels. It wasn't worth shaving my legs to my knees...my wife's idea.

Yea, she was just tired of your hairy leggs tickling her leggs at night Coach...

Perhaps when you get more fingerlings, you might put them in a fry basket to keep them out of the plumbing until they grow large enoughto not get lost in the plumbing.