High PH problem

[steve]

My 8.5 PH has not dropped for 7 weeks of fishless cycling. Have hoped it would drop as have heard many times will be high for cycle up. Yesterday added fish. Have been running with low ammonia and Nitrate 40ppm. Seems to be cycling through good. My tap water is 8.4, when I originally tested it was 7.4 so though I would be ok. My river rock did not foam up with vinegar when originally tested. Have added muriatic dosing to drop ph about .2 ocassionally. Yesterday dosed to 8.3, today down to 8.1. Will probably buffer back up though. My ferrocement tank is pool painted so should seal? With luck maybe will drop later as I've heard theses systems can run high at first. Had algae 1 month ago, pretty much gone since then. Any ideas or input appreciated? Hope I'm not dead in the water after all this project build.

[Bill Moore]

 

I was in Canada Sunday thru Wednesday (Nov 27-30) and when I measured pH, it had held steady at 7.63. As a comparison, I let stand for even longer a 5 gal bucket of tap water (approx 3.5-4 gal actual liquid). I measured it too when I returned and it reads pH 8.73.  This tells me the pH in the system is beginning to stabilize closer to neutral. If you look closely at the attached photo, you'll notice what appears to be a white substance coating some of the hydroton. I am wondering if this isn't some of the calcium from the water that has evaporated from the system and left this residue behind. You'll also note that the first transplanted Swiss Charge root is starting to thrive, later two also starting to respond.

Radish seedlings developing also.

[TCLynx]

Sounds good.

[Danny Daniel]

Im thinking of ways so i can get the water to warm up, ill get something to keep the greenhouse warm, my dad said he has found something that runs on diesel so it should cost me like 5 bucks for a few nights. the water is around 30 im thinking, the thermomitor i got goes to 60 n does not show lower lol i should get a different one.

 

so if the water never gets to 55 f i should never feed them  :p  lol

 

 

[TCLynx]

Well you might try a little food every once in a while but if they don't eat, you need to remove the feed so it doesn't build up and create a breeding ground for bad bacteria.

[Danny Daniel]

how am i going to do that, there is so much gunk down there now, im still worried about the fungus build up on the fish guts that i still have not got out, its just so much in there i have to do a complete water change to get it out.

 

The "tote" system is nice but its so hard to get work done with a heavy grow bed sitting on top of the FT.  thats why i like the zip grow tower idea its much better :).

[TCLynx]

often times you can use a net to scoop out alot of the gunk and make sure the pump is sucking up what gunk you stir up or if you have an extra pump handy that you can suck the extra gunk up to the grow bed with it as you stir things up.

 

Keep in mind you probably only want to do this once in a while since repeated disturbance in the tank will stress the fish.

[Danny Daniel]

good idea, alot of the gunk goes and gets stuck on the side of the bucket i have the pump in.

 

2 things i need to do, remove the filter on the pump, so the  gunk doesnt get stuck on it and goes through it.

 

and second i need to clean more of the gunk out :).

 

nice thanks again for the great advice.

[RupertofOZ]

I'd remove the bucket as well

[TCLynx]

The bucket or baskets or whatever were put in place because there were fish found suck to the pump.  However if there is a sponge filter in the pump and the pump is not able to suck the gunk out of the tank, then I'm thinking perhaps the fish didn't get killed by the pump but rater just wound up against it after they died of some other causes.

[Danny Daniel]

ya that is possible, today i found 2 more dead fish, one was on his back when i saw him but was moving very little then just died, the other one was dead for maybe for a few days, cuz he had all the white color fungus around him. i removed the filter around the pump so the gunk can get into the pump, the bucket was not stopping the gunk from  getting into the pump the filter was, because when i looked into the bucket today it was all gunk inside of it  all stuck on the filter so i cleaned the filter and took it off so this time im thinking it should work better.

Im not to worried anymore as much, this is my first system and there is SOOO much i would change to it, but i can't because of the way its built and its just not worth the time, i can build a better one besides im going to be putting up my ziptowers soon so thats more on my mind, but i still want to keep the system alive so im doing all i can for it :).

[randy proctor]

I know I am new to Aquaponics gardening site, anyone out there with high PH, our water is normally high in PH, we tried several things, if you live around a lake, find a piece of driftwood that has washed upon the shore, cut it up into logs you pick size for your system, put in tank with the fish to float around.  We now have perfect PH.  The fish loves the logs ha  We have 6 tanks @ 125 gallon each with Tilapia and 12 grow beds.   We love aquaponics.  We are currently searching for alternate energy to run the pumps, air and heaters etc.  Any ideas.  BY the way what is UPS?????

[TCLynx]

UPS (Uninterruptable Power Supply)  Like used for computers, basically a mains power unit that also has a battery and will automatically switch to battery power when mains power cuts out to keep from suddenly pulling the plug on a computer.  Most are not up to running any larger pumps but they would be an option for keeping a small air pump or tiny water pump running.