Disaster Guppy Tank Overflowed!

When I check my system this morning, the water in the guppy tank had overflowed spilling water on the floor below. Several guppies were found on the floor and on the tilapia tank mesh covering. Luckily, most were still alive and I scooped them up with a dry leaf. Some dead ones were probably killed by ants.

Guppies on the floor... Still alive because the floor is wet...

Killed by ants...

Some were found inside the shade cloth...

The reason this happened is due to the modification of the outlet pipe that I made yesterday. I wanted the outlet to draw water from the bottom of the guppy tank to suck debris at the bottom. The outlet pipe also has a fine mesh that prevents tiny guppy fries from exiting the outlet...

The T-connecter is used to prevent a siphoning action from happening. It also allows easy insertion and removal of the green mesh for cleaning...

Problem happens when too much poop got stuck at the green mesh preventing water from exiting through the outlet fast enough causing an overflow...

Photo of fish poop stuck on the green mesh...

Luckily not much water and guppies was lost from this tragedy. Ill need to redesign a better filtered outlet pipe this time. I also did a water quality check:

Traffic light... Ammonia, Nitrite, Nitrate...

Ammonia: still green... 1.0

Nitrite: strangely, yellow color... < 0.5

Nitrate: photo is too dark... Its actually cherry red... > 50

Nitrite levels are lowering... This is sign of bacteria growth!

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New Tank for the Guppies!

The old circular guppy tank is actually a plastic kitchen basin/tub that had been under the sun for about 4 years now. Its upper surface is turning to powder and should be very fragile by now. What Im worried about is the amount of plastic chemicals that had been leaching into the system for all these years. In fact, there is a strong plastic smell when I sniff the basins rim.

Plastic surface turning into powder... The effects of 4 years of sun damage...

White patches are 4 year old stains from adhesive paper tape... Those lighter colored scratch marks are my attempts at removing the tape... Scratching the surface releases a lot of dust particles and smell...

And so, I decided to get them a new tank today. Its smaller than the growbed but much bigger than the previous circular tank. After adding the new tank to the system, I realized that quite a significant amount of water was drawn up to the new tank lowering the water depth in the tilapia tank. I worry that the shallower water will now cause the water to heat up quicker during noon. And so I proceeded to add 3 more pails (39 litres) of water salted to 3ppt into the system.

This photo was taken at 8:15 pm. It was already pretty dark during that time, but the cameras flash made it seems like it was taken during noon.

Just to be safe, I will conduct further water changes in the future to remove any more lingering chemicals in the systems water. I wont be consuming any vegetables (the mint, pegaga, and kangkong) that was planted or will be planted before completing the future water change in case they had absorbed some chemicals in them. I wont be culling my guppies and pleco as I wont be eating them, but they might continue pooping out plastic tainted poo for some time which may go in to my plants or find a way into tilapia blood stream. I will ignore those minute traces of plastic chemicals and only seek to minimize instead of a total removal. Im sure I should be worrying more about other pollutants such as vehicle exhaust and cigarette smoke than plastic chemicals leaching in to water.

Thanks for reading...

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Disaster Tank Overflowed

It has been raining heavily for the past few days. Which means raining season has arrived and that means bad news for my aquaponics system. In the past, the storms in my area had drowned my seedlings, damaged my plants, carried my guppies into the drain outside my house, uprooted big trees, blew roof tiles off houses, and damaged my verandah.

Yesterday, I found 2 tilapia laying motionless at a very wrong place:

A group of black ants collectively planning out how to dissect this piece of flesh

No ants on this one

Palm sized tilapia. Could have been fresh on my dinner plate.

Normally, my system works fine under heavy rain and all. Any extra water will flow out through the overflow at the side of the tank. But things are different now, I have an additional grow bed which adds to the surface area collecting rain. The tank outlet, which has strainer holes, probably got clogged by poop and couldnt let water out faster than the input from the rain. Over time, the water level will rise till the rim of the tank. Also with the addition of the second grow bed, there is a rare chance of both grow beds flushing at the same time. When this happens, the tank water will rise by 10 centimeters in less than a minute. With the water level already at the rim of the tank, a double flush will create a surge strong enough to push even large tilapias out of the tank.

Although there is a slight rotting smell, they looked fresh with their gills still red. I decided to freeze them to make food for stray cats in the future.

Thanks for reading!

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Top Five Aquaponics Fish for The Fish Tank

In our earlier article we have given you an elementary idea about Aquaponics system and basics of Aquaponics Design. To extend our discussion here, in this article we will give you an idea about the various Aquaponics Fish which you can grow in the system. Though you can grow almost any fish you want, we recommend that you stick with fresh water fishes as most of the vegetables don’t like salt water.

So here is top five Aquaponics fish of our choice:

1.    Tilapia: Tilapia is a warm water fish. Ideal temperature ranges from 70 to 85 degree F. The best part of growing tilapia is that most of the varieties are resistant to diseases and pests and can survive low oxygen  level also. Tilapia grows very fast and can reach a weight of 1 kilo in 6 to 8 months. A downside of the story is in some places growing tilapia is prohibited. So if you plan to grow them first check the rule book of your country.

2.    Koi: They can survive in a high variety of water temperature (ranging from 30 to 80 degree F). They are brightly colored and can be considered as ornamental fish. Over time they grow whiskers around their mouth and can grow really large. Koi are very tasty and you can definitely use them as food. They are generally expensive compared to other fishes.

3.    Catfish: They are bottom dwellers; meaning they remain in the bottom of the tank. They are warm water (love temperature of 60 to 80 degree F) fish. The mature fish can reach a length of 18 inches and can weight up to 1and half kilos. Use a fish tank whose diameter is at least 4 feet if you are planning to grow catfish. It doesn’t have any scales and is a good choice if you are planning to eat your fish. A mature catfish can feed an entire family. A word of caution: some of the catfishes have spines on their fins; so be careful while harvesting.

4.    Goldfish: Goldfish are cultured mostly for ornamental purposes and less for eating due to their fantastic color varieties and body types. They like the water temperature same as the catfishes. They can reach up to 10 inches in length. They are very social and love interacting with humans. Goldfishes release a lot of ammonia into the water which is why it is a great choice for the Aquaponic system.

5.    Trout: This is a cold water (ranges from 50 to 65 degree F) fish. They are delicious and thus used mostly for eating purpose. These fishes are carnivorous.  For growing trout you are required to provide them a lot of oxygen and quality water. Some people prefer to grow trout in the winter and some warm water fish during the summer seasons.


Here are some points to remember:

1.     Don’t mix herbivorous and carnivorous fishes together. Otherwise you will be left with only one variety of the fish in the tank.

2.    Don’t mix warm and cold water fishes.

3.    Maintain the proper temperature inside the fish tank.


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