My fish died

[Adam Shivers]

I was wondering if there are any Ideas how to balance my system without any expensive tests. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to afford a test kit. Maybe it's not possible but I thought maybe someone has had success with something that I could glean from. I started my system with goldfish as I have always had success with them living long in just a bowl that we keep clean. Well why would they all die when the plants are helping me? Too many? - I've never had so many (15 or less) but I've also not had a 55 gallon aquarium either. I've had little one to two gallon bowls before. All of my fish died.

[TCLynx]

Or they often have a baffle as well since some solids will float on top and you don't want those flowing out either.  Important part is the tank has to be big enough that the flow really gets slowed down through it to allow the solids to settle.  this is sometimes challenging so people have tried things like swirl filters to allow faster flow through without necessarily requiring as large a tank.

 

But yes, a clarifying tank is essentially just a settling tank.

[Adam Shivers]

I need to figure out a way to baffle a simple bucket.

Hey I just got a UV treatment system put together (with stuff lying around believe it or not) so that I can kill the algae dna in the system. This is per the gentleman I was talking to you about that is in my neighborhood. He told me that's how he keeps algae out of his pond is by pu,ping it through a uv light tube every once in a while. (he may have said in the spring).

[Adam Shivers]

Hey does anyone know the most direct rout to figuring out how to grow/produce enough food to feed a 5 member family? plan ideas, etc.?

 I have some ideas and yet have NEVER done anything this complete before.

     My family is in a transition that will turn everything around for us. My wife has the rent covered and it is my job (not that she doesn't help with everything) to calculate plan and implement something to cover all food + enough to sell to cover the rest of the bills. this way we have a plan in place for if the savings are deminished. This is something I will post several places to explain for redundancies as I am raising the chances that I catch someone that has a solution, has done this very thing, or has any ideas.

By the way, this is an exciting thing for our family and not a scary one. I have a lot of support from people as we are making this transition as they see the importance of this and what it can do for others that have less support than we do!

They may also not have support like this community in APG that I have been blessed with and we want to "teach them to fish". Thank you everyone!

[Chi Ma]

First find out what your family likes or will eat. No use in growing stuff your family won't eat.

 

Guinea pigs are a good protein source. Cheap and prolific.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6ZaynParR8

Adam Shivers said:

Hey does anyone know the most direct rout to figuring out how to grow/produce enough food to feed a 5 member family? plan ideas, etc.?

 I have some ideas and yet have NEVER done anything this complete before.

     My family is in a transition that will turn everything around for us. My wife has the rent covered and it is my job (not that she doesn't help with everything) to calculate plan and implement something to cover all food + enough to sell to cover the rest of the bills. this way we have a plan in place for if the savings are deminished. This is something I will post several places to explain for redundancies as I am raising the chances that I catch someone that has a solution, has done this very thing, or has any ideas.

By the way, this is an exciting thing for our family and not a scary one. I have a lot of support from people as we are making this transition as they see the importance of this and what it can do for others that have less support than we do!

They may also not have support like this community in APG that I have been blessed with and we want to "teach them to fish". Thank you everyone!

[TCLynx]

Well how to grow enough food not only for the family to eat but also to have income from it is definitely going to vary depending on climate and soil etc.

 

Some small food producing animals are a handy thing.  I've found Muscovy Ducks to be a good addition along with some chickens for eggs.  And then a combination of soil and aquaponic veggies.

We do still find ourselves buying beef, pork, rice, dry beans, bread, Dairy, sugar, oil and coffee.  However by avoiding most processed foods we do reduce the grocery bill a fair bit.

[Adam Shivers]

I have quail and plans for getting a certain amount of quail per day. and ofcourse eggs come with this. I have just never fully worked out and actually done it. I won't believe it until I see it I was just wondering what others had seen. I hope to learn about fish harvesting so that I can have so many fish a week -so many quail a week type things but understand quail best as of yet

[Chi Ma]

You might want to make another thread or blog on this subject.

[Adam Shivers]

yes. I'm sorry. I won't repeat in other threads anymore for the sake of those nice enough to have followed more than one of them.

[Jonathan Farrand]

When signs of trouble in the fish department it never hurts for a water change or many untill your system becomes balanced.  Goldfish as you well know are a very hardy fish.  If there isn't visbible signs on the fish of disease,infection, or external parasites you most likely have water in high levels of the nitrogen cycle. A series of slight water changes will remedy toxic fish water. 

[TCLynx]

While water changes are the last resort to keeping fish alive, it should be noted that water changes can unbalance things and actually slow initial cycling.  There are many factors that affect this of course and small water changes are generally far better than drastic ones.  Also, if the source water for the changes is treated, that can require conditioning or hinder cycling further.

[Chandara Khan]

Well, there are some cheap resolutions to adapt.Generally there are two main problems that cause your fish die. They are water quality and bacteria or virus problems. Since I don't know which one that attacked your fishes, first of all let's talk in case of water quality problem. I personally recommend you to monitor your fish daily activities which means you should take some time to notice your fish's eating, swimming or surface air breathing activities. If you notice that your fishes do not eat as much as usual, it means there is something wrong with your water quality. What I mean is that generally before the fish die there are some clues or signs that can tell you something goes wrong in your system.  Thus the simple resolution is to keep changing your water with clean water. Let say 10% per day and you better check your air stones to see whether their holes are blocked with sediment, algae or fish poo or not. If so, you'd better clean them or use the new ones. You better add more air stones in case you see the fish gulping so often at the surface area of your water. By changing the water like this the concentration of NH4 & and NO2 will be lessen. If it is in the second problem, You need to examine clearly on fish body to whether there is any infection , fin rot or dropsy or not. You'd better use some medicines to cure them. But the simplest medicine is Salt.

[TCLynx]

Salt is generally the only safe fish medicine for in an aquaponics system since most other things are not safe for people to eat as food!!!!!   Don't treat with any aquarium medications in an aquaponics system and if you plan to eat the fish, don't treat them with any aquarium medications either even if you do it in an isolation separate tank.