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Thread: Water clarity

  1. #1

    Water clarity

    Hi all, I'm having a few water clarity problems , never had probs before , I have 2600g pond with a 55w uv new bulb, about a week ago i treated for blanket weed , and the pond is mostly full sun,so in the morning water is pretty clear then as the day goes on it gets murkier till you can't see the drain,so is this the weed coming off in bits during the day , I've had bulb out and connected and only at the ends does it show violet colour , is this right ?,the other thing is i replaced the shade sail this year ,I thought it was cheaper than usual ,when i had a look at the ones i usually buy they stated they're 98* uv proof , so could it be the cheap sail not giving enough uv protection...



  2. #2
    Senior Member Rank = Rokusai RipleyRich's Avatar
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    Did I understand that you have had the UV connected outside its housing ie just bare tube?

    If so that`s really not a good idea as it can cause real damage to your eyes.

    As a constructive answer, I really don`t know, but would assume the tube should light it`s full length. How old is it?
    If the blanket weed is dying off, then it will affect clarity and the more turbulence in the water from high flow and air will keep it in suspension.

  3. #3
    It is a new tube , i will turn the air disk off today and see what happens, thanks ..

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    Senior Member Rank = Supreme Champion davethefish1's Avatar
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    Do not look directly at the UV tube


    you will only see the lighting filaments glow at the ends of the tube as this is what activates the murcury vapour inside the tube to make UV light
    Ultra Violet Light is invisible....
    and as there is no white phosphor lining inside the tube like a normal flourecent, it won't make visible light.

    what a UV tube looks like under a UV camera

    Water clarity-l400-jpg
    Attached Images Attached Images
    Last edited by davethefish1; 02-06-2020 at 09:54 AM.

  5. #5
    Ok,so uv is ok, I'll see what it's like with the air turned off , I've always treated blanket weed a bit late but had a block built filter so it could handle the big stuff,now i have a nexus i treated while it was still short and I'm hoping its just the fines all floating around like rich said..

  6. #6
    With the nexus is it better to have a higher flow or lower ?

  7. #7
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Adult Champion NickK-UK's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scottyp View Post
    Ok,so uv is ok, I'll see what it's like with the air turned off , I've always treated blanket weed a bit late but had a block built filter so it could handle the big stuff,now i have a nexus i treated while it was still short and I'm hoping its just the fines all floating around like rich said..
    A UV will only kill what goes through it - the blanket week in the pond will grow/reproduce in the pond.

    I'm running a pond without a UV in full sunlight and added air. There is some algae but the fish snack on it. The pond is massively over-specced at the moment with about 4x the filtration and a drum. The drum output is looking like a swamp algae mess - so the drum itself is keeping a lot of the algae in check. The flow rate of 6,000lph in a pond that is 1700l means the pond algae doesn't have much chance to stick around before it gets filtered. The fish are fine with the rate - and at night this is dropped to 4000lph. I have lilies and other denitrifying plants that are sucking the nitrates out of the water so the level is about 0.1ppm.

    So the first question is - why do you get algae. What's the Nitrate level on average?

    Has the Nexus bio managed to mature yet?

  8. #8
    On my nt labs pond kit I don't get a reading for nitrates also my ammonia readings with the kusuri kit are 0 matching the sample colour to the colour on the card , so I've took this to be matured ,so you don't think it's the fines off the dying blanket weed..

  9. #9
    Senior Member Rank = Rokusai RipleyRich's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scottyp View Post
    With the nexus is it better to have a higher flow or lower ?
    Fines are the bugbear for many people, and there seems to be this obsession with high flow rates which makes it worse.

    If you think back to the good old days of block built filters and early vortexes, and if you have ever visited a sewage farm, then you will see that the principle is a large volume with very low flow.
    This is to allow solids to fall out of suspension.

    While ever you have high velocity and turbulence caused by high flow and air movement, then the solids will generally remain in suspension unless you are passing them through a resistive fine screen such as a drum or filter wool.

    I have never owned a nexus, but did have an easy pod and know from experience that with static K1 you will get far better settlement of fines the slower the flow rate is through it. Again, the principle is that slower flow and water passing through the many nooks and crannies in the static chamber, allows the solids to settle.

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    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Nanasai Fishplanetkoi's Avatar
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    I fully agree with RipleyRich above !

    The obsession with turning a pond over 2 - 3 times an hour is for most filters not needed.

    The high flow rates that is now thought to be the norm, only started when Bakki showers came about, which maybe does need a high flow rate to get the oxygen into the media.

    As said above, for moving bed filters and box/chamber filtration, the dwell time can be far slower. Over the years I have tried lots of different flow rates, for my 450 litres of K1 and a further 6 sheets of jap mat.
    I currently turn my pond over every 1.5 - 2 hours. I have tried less, but all that happens is the K1 jams around the outlets due to the increased flow, therefore not turning over, and it certainly didn't make any difference to the water parameters.

    Having much more filtration than you need, is far more important than super high flow rates that's for sure. So if you are turning over too quickly, you will be stirring up the fines also.

  12. #11
    Senior Member Rank = Kyusai Sim's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scottyp View Post
    On my nt labs pond kit I don't get a reading for nitrates also my ammonia readings with the kusuri kit are 0 matching the sample colour to the colour on the card , so I've took this to be matured ,so you don't think it's the fines off the dying blanket weed..
    it maybe that you blanket weed is feeding on the nitrates and is keeping it low. The ammonia reading is just showing that the system is working, mature dealing with the load your putting on it at the moment.

  13. #12
    Well how do i get rid of the nitrates ?

  14. #13
    Trickle tower
    Bakki shower
    Plants
    Water changes


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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    Senior Member Rank = Adult Champion Twhitenosugar's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by bigcarpchaser View Post
    Trickle tower
    Bakki shower
    Plants
    Water changes


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
    Does a trickle tower remove Nitrates?

    I thought you need a high flow rate I.e. bakki, to remove nitrates.

    I have a 4 tier shower (more of a trickle than a bakki) And my nitrates went up to around 80 recently. Think I got carried away with the feed in the hot weather and the pond is still in nps mode.Water clarity

    Anyway I hope my shower does remove some nitrate, as I have no space for a veggie filter/plants and minimal space for anoxic baskets (perhaps I could get squeeze 3 or 4 in).

    I think the only positive I get from the high nitrate reading is it shows my bio filters are successfully 'breaking' ammonia and nitrite down.

    Sent from my SM-A520F using Tapatalk
    13,000L fibreglassed raised pond with window

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  17. #15
    Trickle tower update

    I’m sure I’ve just saved Syd a job


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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  19. #16
    Extreme Koi Member Rank = Adult Champion NickK-UK's Avatar
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    If you have a microscope you can take a pond water sample and have a look.


    If you see something like this - then it's algae (same with the small single green cells) - this is string algae, with each box being a cell. I got this out of my drum waste.

    If you see brown structures that look like dead cells or pieces of plants then you know it's dead material that's flowing around the pond.

    IMG_7809.jpg

 

 

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