|
I am not sure I understand how a carbon filter is going to change things related to ph swings and algae growth??? I won't use pp or a UV light and filter the phosphates, sulfurs, and iron out of my source water and see how it goes. I will let you know. My ph is in the mid 7s now. In a nice way I am trying to tell you that imho Roddy is trying to help but is having you fix symptoms, which do need some adressing (like a tumor causing a headache, fine to take some tylenol for the headache but it won't make the tumor go away?), the root of the problem is source water and filtration, and possibly feed content.
If you have ever studied physical geography you would know that at that depth are lots and lots of limestone beds where water collects, which will cause very high phosphate levels (among other things but that is the most significant in terms of algae growth), and possibly very high levels of iron, and sulfates, which will cause your whole ph cycle to respond freakishly and out of the norm to normal treatments and the infusion of air and oxygen. High iron can kill your koi. Your lava rock may also be leaching iron sulfite or other iron related elements. At those depths there is not much oxygen in the water, so bringing it up and spraying it will gas off lots of stuff (carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, etc etc), and also oxygenate. Then that changes your whole chemistry and ph balance.
You will not find koi living in your well water, or any other type of fish. So trying to keep the oxygen levels low only duplicates that environment, rather than eradicating the real issues. It will give short term relief, but won't resolve the real issues imho, and could possibly weaken your koi immune systems, making them susceptible to other problems. It is a proven fact that high levels of oxygen boost koi immune systems, and low levels supress it. You might want to ask JR if the iron can cause the red lines that were brought up.
I also recommend highly a shower, as Luke did and I know JR has many times too. The PP may also kill some things in your upflow filter causing problems. I think you need to consider ways to keep debris and anaerobic bacterias from collecting down there in the corners. I do not recommend less aeration, just the opposite, I think you need much more. I personally would try to find a way to worm an airstone down into each of those corners, to avoid having to dig out the whole thing. One way is to take a pipe large enuf to slide the airstone thru, and blast water thru it to sort of dig down thru the lava rock while pushing and wiggling til it reaches the bottom, then slide your airstone down and remove the pipe, and gently push the lava rock back into place.
We had some heavy rains last week when this thread started loaded with volcanoe junk, my water greened up too, and my ph went up to 8.9. WAY too high for me. I added an airstone, some more biological filter media in my shower and creek, japmat disk in my vortex, and am putting the source water filter on today to get rid of phosphates and iron and sulfates from both the rain runoff water and the source water. Now my ph is already down to 7.5, and will be 7.2 within a few days. The algae will be dead within a week or so when I have replaced enuf pond water with iron, sulfur, and phosphate free source water and given it a couple days. What I am trying to say tactfully, is that the algae CANNOT make the problem, it simply feeds off the problem, as your friend's pond is telling you. Take it's food away and it will leave like anything else.
How can adding an airstone affect ph??? Not directly in terms of lowering it in your situation. hwat it will do is help to gas off nitrates and ammonia, cutting away at the algae's food supply, reducing it's growth and causing it to start to slowly thin. That will means it will have less ability to negatively affect your ph. In a test facility with no algae issues and sufficient biological filtration to remove nitrates completely, that would be ineffective. But in our ponds, it would work quite well.
__________________
'Sometimes it take a talking donkey to turn things around in the right direction, ask Balaam."
| 
05-22-2006
Quote: 
Sounds like a plan 
Linear Mode
