New System (Plants seems to be stressed)

[aquaponics]

Hi,
Sry to mention , that now i am trying to bring my Ph (to around < 7.0)by adding one cup of venyger (which is weak acid) which may not cause stress to fish.
I haven't done this when my fish are in system previously.Now fish are there in the system so i am doubting on this kind of activity.

Suggest me if i can go ahead and bring my Ph down little bit with venyger one cup at a time which means just 20 ml.

thanks,
Mohan Ch.

[Yabbies4me]

Hio Mohan,

I wouldn't bother with the vinegar, use the Hydrochloric acid, it will do a better job and is far cheaper.

As far as dropping your pH and reasons why it may be high, maybe have a quick read of these three short threads (you may have to cut & paste the links into the address bar):

http://www.aquaponics.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=4765&highlight=hydrochloric+carbo nates+acid+dissipate

http://www.aquaponics.net.au/forum/showthread.php?t=4468&highlight=top-up+water+carbonates+acid

http://www.aquaponics.net.au/forum/showthread.php?p=53878&highlight=top-up+water+carbonates+acid#post53878


I also agree with you that your system was probably over stocked, 4 or 5 gold fish would be fine in 50L.

Your water is also probably very warm and the warmer the water the more toxic the Ammonia is. Also the higher the pH the more toxic the Ammonia is, so you have a combined problem of high water temps and high water pH, which would make even a very small amount of Ammonia lethal to the fish… Have a look at the Ammonia toxicity chart in the following post:

http://www.aquaponics.net.au/forum/showpost.php?p=52069&postcount=19

Cheers.

[aquaponics]

Hi Yabbies,
Thanks for the help and i have decreased the no of fish in my FT today my readings are as below:
Ph: 7.2
NH3(ammonia): 0 PPM
NO2 : 0 PPM
NO3: 40 PPM

everything looks stable from past three days and my fish seems hungry when i went to feed them and they seems happy and i have increased my plants density.

I will decrease the Ph slowly when I see the same readings for another 3/4 days . So there wont be any stress for my fish.
Thanks for support and help.

thanks,
Mohan ch

[Yabbies4me]

Hi Mohan,

A pH of 7.2 is perfectly fine, especially for a young system, I wouldn't do anything about the pH.

Soon enough it should start dropping as the system matures, then you'll be worrying about buffering the pH up, not down!

Cheers.

[aquaponics]

Hi Yabbies,

Thanks for the quick reply. I am just testing everyday and feeding my fish . As you suggested I will not do any adjustments.

thanks,
Mohan Ch.

[davidl]

with the pH levels, yes stop changing it.

When you have a high pH of 8.0 or more
- slowly adjust it down to about 7.8 by about 0.1 per day.
- then stop changing it

When you have a low pH of 6.0 or less
- slowly adjust it up to about 6.2 by adding carbonates to buffer the pH up. A readily available source of carbonates is crushed egg shells, put them in a stocking or some kind of porous bag for easy removal.