Brownish water a problem?

[Jim S.]

I pumped the rain water of the top of my pool and into my IBC fish tank... about 230 gallons at about 54 degrees F.  The problem is that the water had lots of maple leaves from last month or so.  The water going into the IBC looks like ice tea.  No algae though... just tea water.

 

I checked the PH and it looks to be about 6.5.  I did a test for ammonia and surprisingly enough... it looks like about 2ppm.  I was expecting zero.  I'll take it again just to be sure though.

The nitrate test shows zero.

Three of the grow beds are circulating to a sump tank and filled with expanded clay.  The PH of the grow bed water is about 8.2. 

I'll need ammonia for cycling the grow beds so maybe the ammonia in the fish tank water is a good thing.  I'm just not sure about the tea color.  Fish seem to like to hide... maybe maple leaf tea isn't bad?

Any thoughts or suggestions are welcome.

Here's video of the set up:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAi3X606WW8

[TCLynx]

tea colored water is not a worry.  Most mature AP systems have an amber to tea color tint.

However, you might think about what might have gotten into that water that was on the pool cover.  If you have an ammonia level, might there have been animal droppings/urine that could account for the ammonia?  Then you have to decide how you feel about using that water to cycle your system if perhaps some critter pooed or peed on your pool cover before you pumped the water off. 

In general we don't really want to contaminate our AP systems with waste from warm blooded creatures like birds and rodents but you will have to decide if you are worried about it or not.

[Jim S.]

I'm thinking that it's probably from birds since there is the large maple tree at the one corner of the pool.  What are the negative effects of bird doody?  There were no visible solids that I could see while pumping the water in. 

I did see some dead worms on the pool cover today while I was cleaning it up... could they add ammonia somehow?

[TCLynx]

Yea, any decomposing matter can contribute ammonia if it is far enough along in decomposition.