Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Had 3 bluegill survive the winter without supplemental heating in Denver, CO.

Introduced 30 new bluegill of 2-4" length on April 23.

Fish have been fed a diet of frozen bloodworms mixed with softened Aquamax pellet feed.

May 3rd, one fish was found dead at bottom of tank. No markings, no apparent infections or lesions.

May 12th, one fish was starting to swim almost vertically. More like diagonally. I could also see what appeared to be a white growth on his mouth, as well as a spot on his back. I pulled the fish out to inspect and take pictures. Isolated the fish in a bucket of FT water with aerator. Fish had perished this morning.

I have attached pictures of the fish. I’m thinking it is columnaris, but it would possibly also be ammonia poisoning. However, after checking my ammonia levels, they were barely at .5.

Any ideas?







I've got 3 established strawberry plants in one half barrel. I can always turn off that barrel's water flow and water them manually, while allowing the other beds to flow. So perhaps salt would work? Specifically, what kind of salt?

How do the gills look?

You know, I thought about that this morning. I forgot to make note.

Part of my brain thinks they may have been a little pink, indicating ammonia. But my mind could be playing tricks on itself after reading red gills = too much ammonia all morning.

I'll scoop a few out this afternoon and snap some photos.

Probably a good idea to use exam gloves when handling dead fish like these. It's not likely but some of the bacteria could cause infections in humans.

Columnaris can also have an affect on the gills, causing dead gill tissue. Unless these fish sat around for awhile, I think they have an infection that killed them, although, they may have gotten sick because they were stressed by something like a nitrite or ammonia spike.

By the way that looks like it's a Redear sunfish.

HAHA, THANK YOU Scotty.

When I purchased the bluegill, he was netting as many as he could, but the pickings were getting slim. He raised up one fish and said, "YOU WANT A _________?" I didn't quite hear him, but I said, "sure, i'll give it a shot!". Then it bugged me that I had one fish different than the rest and couldn't remember the what it was called.

Well, all the fish are the same now!

And I will follow your suggestion of using exam gloves this afternoon. Thank you, again.

I've been monitoring the fish and water over the past few days. Nothing alarming about the ammonia/nitrate/nitrite levels. They stay pretty constant. I made a vacuum to suck any waste/old food from the bottom of the tank, but it wasn't all that bad, either.

One thing I did learn, that I probably should've investigated a year ago when I began the system: Denver water puts chloramine, not chlorine, in their water supply. However, I used the very same water last season and the fish were fine up until the tank froze over in the winter.

I do think there is an ich outbreak in the tank, as I have seen a few fish in the past couple days start to develop the tell-tale white dots on them.

I plan on salting the tank, but a couple of questions:

exactly WHAT kind of salt do I need to buy?

One grow bed has strawberries in it. I figure I can shut this growbed off with the ball valve, and hand-water the strawberries in the morning and evening. Not sure if that'll kill 'em or not. Or should I just plan on keeping salt at lower ppm for a longer duration?

Any help is appreciated.

You could try disconnecting the bed but it might become of source of parasites for re-infestation. If you do disconnect it I think you should either circulate the water within the bed or aerate the water in the bed.

The salt is regular table salt (sodium chloride, NaCl) but without iodine and without anti-caking agents. Pool salt should work if you need a lot.

Vitamin C can help with removing the chloramines. I think I'd be more concerned with the anti-bacterial aspect of chloramines and their affect on your bio-filtration in the grow beds. As long as you're not changing a large percentage of the system water it probably won't make that much difference (I'm not absolutely positive of this but 10 to 20% should be OK - I suppose it depends on how much they put in though ).

I really only have to top off the water, so a 5-10% water change is about the max I'm going for.

I hadn't read that about vitamin C, I will have to try it.

I have a spare water pump. I am considering setting up a tub next to the grow bed, re-routing the drain to the tub, and running that one bed separately. These strawberry plants are pretty well established and produced well their first year. I can add a small amount of ammonia to the water to ensure the cycle continues.

1ppt of salt should kill ich and not kill strawberries.