Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I bought my K2 something like month after you got yours, I cleaned the MBBR a few days ago, I didn't see any bio_slime at all on the K2. If it weren't for the media beds I don't think my system would have cycled as quick as it did.

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I have nice bioslime inside all my KI, will know something in a few minutes.

That's encouraging, I think. I need to do tests in the fish pond and aquarium and this morning. I was astounded by what high nitrates effected my Koi. Those were not happy fish. I feel for ya.

It's not really whether you have bio-slime, it's what kind of organisms you have attached to the media. They can just be a slight coating on the media to be doing their job. A slime might indicate you have more of them or it might indicate that heterotrophic bacteria have taken over. Eventually the right set of organisms will populate the filter if the conditions are right.

Well, so much for that idea. Nitrites up to well over 2, maybe even 5. Those color are too close to tell. High. Doing another partial water change now.

Worse news- 2 of the new large koi jumped out and are dead. My fault. Ryan told me they could jump, and I didn't have a top on the large FT with koi. I'm going to store to get some cord to put the netting over the top, like tilapia tanks have.

My hypothesis on the nitrite spike is that by slowing down the flow in the large tanks, the nitrites rose too high, and that effected the rest of the system?? I had to lower the flow to compensate for the decreased flow into the netting filter/mbbr, and that reduced my turnover to less then 1 per hour in the tilapia tanks.

Now, I'm going to have to figure out if I can increase retention, while keeping tank turn over rate adequate. I thought of another options as well. I can take the existing sump and drain it into another sump to increase retention time. I could then double the time, and add more K1 to the existing sump and create 2 mbbrs. This would require some plumbing, but not a huge amount. I have the space along the same wall, would just move my bench/testing area down a bit. I'm a bit concerned about having enough air to run both.

I haven't even tested for Nitrates in a long time...that due now also. Thanks for the reminder.

I've had a low-density RAS unit running with a ~30gal K1 media MBBR for about 2 years now. The beads have never collected any slime but rather turned a bit brownish-yellow (kind of like the color of tannins in the water) a few months or so after the system finished cycling and I added fish. They have been like that ever since and I've never had a problem with ammonia or nitrite. Maybe because it is low-density and there isn't a lot of demand on the microbes but I've never seen the slime other than some on the side of the fish tank.

Sam, that's what my K1 look like now. The inside is a light brown. Ryan said they looked great. I have lots of bioslime on everything else. If I leave a water hose in the tanks overnight, it will get slimy.

Coach, if I were you I would not make all these changes now. Keep it running at the flow that had been working. Let the biofilter cycle under those conditions. Too many changes in flow etc will only create problems and you won't know what is causing what..

I've waited I think 5 weeks, I'll wait 1 more week. After that, I'll need to do something to correct the problem.

It almost seems like they were trying to hold fins until their last breath. I believe the white one was the female that had eggs, the other a male. Much worse then finding a tilapia on the ground.

It will be 2 months next Thursday since adding the K1. That's more then patient. If the nitrite don't work themselves out by then, I'm going to add another mbbr IBC to double my retention time. Ryan will be back fro Italy by then, and I'll run it by him before I build it. Though about a bakki shower type unit, but no way to get the water up that high unless I take it from the pump, and then it would be only a portion, maybe 20% that I could use, so that would take a long time to ever get all the water cycled through it.

It's here. testing begins tonight.

It sure smells like the Liquid smoke. But at $20.00 a liter, it's a whole lot cheaper the $&.00 for 4 oz.
Sprayed the evil whitefly at the 250/1 rate. Will see.

Did another partial water change today. Had to order another bottle of nitrite test solution. Less then 3 weeks for the whole bottle. That's the bad side of having 16 different FT's. I don't test them all, but they're differences in some, and I'm trying to see what the heck is going on. No feed again today.

It was actually in the 60's today. 69F at about 6:30 AM. I don't think it hit 90 today either. I'll take whatever relief I can get this time of year.

Made a really nice salad to go with our ribs on the Bar-B. It was the fresh malabar spinach, with strawberries, fresh alfalfa sprouts, sliced almonds and a home made red wine vinaigrette dressing. It was awesome. Finishing it off tonight.

Looks really tasty..