Faded K1

[koiholic]

Can anybody suggest why my K1 has faded overnight?
It has gone from a pleasent tan colour to a nearly new colour.
I also have alot of froth developing in the K1 chamber and in the pond from the air stones.
Can anybody put me out of my misery?

[MikeM]

I can only imagine a chemical contamination killing off/ oxidizing the biofilm that thoroughly. Something was put in the pond. Happen to use Potassium Permanganate?

[dick benbow]

Greetings koiholic. Welcome here and thank-you for posting!


Your K-1 stuff is great stuff. I ran it for a year and learned alot, Mine cycled just like yours. took for ever to get colored then ran great then bingo, the brown is gone and it's light beige in color.

I believe that the bacteria builds up and in the roiling gets to a point where it gets knocked down again. it never did build back up to the color it was in the beginning yet the water parameters held well. My koi kichi who also had k-i and still does, went thru the same thing and thought he needed to increase the air. that really whitened up the k-1. So we lessened the air and it came back to about half what it was with the first round. water parameters offered no change in quality. he has been lately decreasing the load yet it remains the same color.

hope this reassures you that others have experience the same thing. I encourage you to get out a fresh test pack and go thru the basic parameters and check. if nothing shows as a concern then you can relax.
you might want to back off the air abit because many with no help or instruction do roil the water harder than is needed. good luck, get us in the loop and let us know what the testing is showing!

[koiholic]

Thanks guys for the replys.
Chemical contamination was one suggestion i was fearing, but i think i would be seeing some ill fish as well, that is certanly not the case as they are ravenous!
I have recently put superverm in, but i have never known it to do this kind of thing before.
One of the beauties of K1 for me was that you can see it working when its brown, if it goes all white and stays that way i will be dissapointed!
As for testing im using Hanna meters so pretty accurate.

[dick benbow]

From the sounds of it, your home free. nice to get a break once in awhile.
hope to hear from you again...

[Maurice]

Rare time for me to have 5 minutes at the PC.
K1 shedding it's bacteria has been a problem for many in the UK.
I've been running the media for 2 years June just gone. In that time I have only suffered the problem once and I was the cause I am sure. I was off to Japan for a trip so to help my good wife Lynn; I cut feed levels prior to going so as to make filter maintenance easier. Within two days the water was cloudy and the media stripped back to white.

I think the reason I have only suffered this 'shedding' once is because I run far less air than many. If the air delivery system is well designed, the media can be made to churn with very little air. I have 350ltr of Kaldnes in a 40" vortex and the whole lot rolls along like 'poetry in motion' on 30ltr of air.

Here is an MPEG clip of this system. On my media player it runs a little fast for true life speed, but you can see the water is not boiling, just rolloing.
http://www.koi-uk.co.uk/filter_systems/k1movie1.mpg
Maurice.

[dick benbow]

Hi Maurice!
Good to see your post! Wish you'd ditch that low class breeder thing of your and put high class human instead. Thanks for your input!

[koiholic]

Well its got worse over the last two days as the ammonia has gone through the roof, rising to 2.6 at its peak, got it down to 2.3 yesterday before doing a load of water changes and chucking in some filter start.
Going to go and do another test and probably some more changes now~!
Wish me luck! :cry:

[James P]

Hi Koialki,

a couple of things- a 'crash' of a an established filter- ANY type of filter is unrelated to the media type--

*check your pH
*check your alkaline reserve
*check to see that your test is reading accurate ( stored well and not dated)
*check to see if the nitrite is a problem as it is likely going to be.
* Obviously, do not feed the fish.


JR

[dick benbow]

JR,
In addition, shouldn't our koiaholic be advised to add some salt?