Fishy mis Adventures Part II Trout Rapture

One fish, two fish, dead fish....*sigh*.....

Recall from Part I, when we decided to take out a few fish to eat, my thought was, "what can it hurt?"  Well, apparently, it can hurt a lot.

The next day, January 4, I found a floater in the tank.  I dont know what caused the fishs death.  In reading about humanely treating fish, I came across a lot of catch-and-release articles.  A couple of things I learned - first, try not to take the fish out of the water at all.  Its like suffocating them.  Next, if you must handle the fish, make sure your hands are wet.  If you touch a fish with dry hands, you are effectively "burning" the fish by removing some of its protective slime.  Also, the protective slime is part of the fishs immune system, so besides causing the fish pain, you are damaging its immune system.  I read on several different sites, that often, if you release a fish and dont handle it properly, it might swim away, so you think the fish is going to live, but it actually swims away and ends up dying.  See photo below.  Note that this is on a standard-size dinner plate (10" or 12"? Im too lazy to go measure it).

Big Dead Fish

Knowing that, when we removed the fish from the water, we tried to put the ones we were going to eat back into the water immediately.  Also, we did not touch the fish with our hands.  I dont know what caused this fish to die.  Maybe it was just shock.  But, it turns out, it was about twice the size of any of the fish we ate!  I think it was the granddaddy trout in our tank. 

OK, so one fish down.  I think I should be down to 30 or 31 fish at this point, so everything is still good, right?

Wrong.

Today, I go down to take care of the dogs, and there are FOUR dead fish floating around.  And a sort-of-alive one hovering near the top of the tank.  The nitrate levels are off the charts.  The water level was a little low, so I added some water, but the nitrite levels were still out of range of my little chart, so I did a 50% water change.  During the water change, yet ANOTHER dead fish comes floating by....AHHHH!!!  Frustration.

The only "good" thing about todays experience is that it has been unseasonably warm all week, with today being the warmest day yet.  It was about 65-70 degrees outside today, so at least I didnt have to do this in subfreezing temperatures.  Its a rather wet and messy process.  It did, however, take me three tries before I found a hose that wasnt frozen, but at least I didnt have to carry the water into the house in buckets.  My back is too old for that kind of work. 

Anyway, heres another picture of fish carcasses.  :-(

This is starting to seem like a rather morbid blog....

More Floaters

Now heres where the trout rapture comes in....this is weird.  My son and I were shining the light in the tank, and it seems like there are only two fish swimming around!  Hopefully, the rest are just so healthy and fast that theyre avoiding the light every time we move it and hiding in the corner (is there a corner in an oval tank?  whatever).  Usually, we can see a bunch of fish shadows swimming around, but now we only see a couple, so my son is convinced the other fish have been raptured. 

I still dont know exactly what happened, but Im guessing one fish died of shock and floated in the water long enough to contaminate the water and kill the other fish.  I just checked the nitrite level again, and although its a lot higher than it should be, at least it seems to have gone down a lot since the water change.  Im hoping that if I dont feed them for a day or two, the level will stabilize.

On a happier note, my plants are still alive.  Actually, I dont know that I would call the plants "happy," but they are alive.  Theyre a little yellow, and growing really slowly, but they are still alive.  If I decide to continue with this, I will have to come up with an artificial light solution.  Here are a couple of pictures taken January 3.  I think I planted the seeds at least two months ago, so you can see that the growth is extremely slow.  I think if I had planted these outside in June, they would be about this size within a week or two.

The good thing is that I didnt lose very many plants when we had the super-sub-zero temperatures a few weeks ago.  There is a gap in the dog door that lets in raw, cold air, and I was afraid it would freeze my plants.  I think it got down to about 40 degrees Fahrenheit, so it was pretty close. 

Bed 1 - Strawberries on the Right, Lettuce and Herbs on the Left

Bed 2 - Sickly Tomato Plant and Some Broccoli and Herbs

Well, thats about it for now.  Not much excitement this winter until recently, so there really wasnt anything to report.  Hopefully the next update will have better news!

Thanks for stopping by!  :-)

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Last Fish Standing

OK, I knew this could happen, and at one point, I even considered buying a backup power supply, but since we havent had a power outage last more than an hour in the last four years, I never got around to it.
Well, thats what I get for ignoring Murphys Law.  Today, during an electrical storm, the transformer in front of our house went out.  The power company repsonded quickly, but they "didnt have a transformer that big on the truck," so they had to go back to the plant in town to get another transformer.  Anyway, three hours later, our power was back on and I was pretty happy.  I think our utility company is awesome...even during blizzards, I havent been without power for more than a couple of hours in the fifteen years Ive lived here.  Unfortunately, I wasnt thinking about my poor fishies.  :-(

According to the guy I bought the fish from, cold-water fish such as trout are very sensitive to lack of oxygen/circulation, and need a constant source of air.  He told me that even a couple of hours is too long for them to go without some kind of air pump or circulation, and I guess he was right.

When my husband went downstairs to feed the dogs, all fish were belly up.  One guy was still breathing, so we left him in the tank, but the rest will be dinner later this week.  Within about 20 minutes, Silvery One was right side up and swimming around in the tank.

Silvery One

Last Fish Standing

So, I guess the other seven fish will be dinner later this week.  BTW, if youre thinking that its unsafe to eat these fish, consider the fact that lots of people will drive at least two hours to go fishing, so if they catch a bunch of fish, drive home, and eat them several hours later, its really no different.  As long as we know that they died from oxygen deprivation, which is what most caught fish die from, theyre safe to eat.  It would be different if they all died from some mysterious leprosy-like fish disease.  Just thought Id mention that, since more than one person has voiced concern over my questionable fish-eating practices.  :-)

Friday Night Fish Fry

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Daddies and Daughters and Why I Love Trout

During the little crisis I described in my previous post, while I was scrambling around the bed of the truck, trying to grab the slimy, floppy fish, I noticed their beautiful markings. It made me think about how I have always had a fascination with trout. Its nice to catch a catfish, bass, or whatever, but I love catching and eating trout! Fresh trout fried in butter....yummmm.

I started to reflect on why I always have a specific craving for trout fried in butter, and I thought of my first memory of eating trout prepared this way...

One Friday evening, when I was about seven, my dad was in the living room, setting up his tackle box. I asked him where he was going, and he said he was going to the Kern River to go fishing. Of course, being seven, my automatic reply (which would have been the same whether he was going to store, going to the park, or going to the dump), was, "Can I go?????!!!!" I assumed the answer would be no, but it was my seven-year-old duty to ask. He looked at me and said, "Get your fishing pole and sleeping bag. Im leaving at 4 in the morning, so youd better be ready." After the shock wore off, I ran out to the garage and got my fishing pole and sleeping bag. The next morning, we left bright and early (actually, I guess it was dark and early) at 4am, with two fishing poles, two sleeping bags, a tackle box, a skillet, and an ice chest with beer, RC cola, and a stick of butter.

I dont actually remember the next part, but my dad has told it so many times, it seems like I remember it. The first day we were there, we each caught our limit pretty early (the limit was ten fish each). There were a couple of young guys camping next to us, and my dad started talking to them. They hadnt caught anything all day (or maybe they had only caught one fish each, I dont remember). They saw the long string of fish my dad was cleaning and asked how many days we had been there. He told them that we had just gotten there that morning, and we had each caught our limits by lunch time. They looked at him and said, "The little girl, too???" He said, "Yep!" Then he invited them to eat with us, since there was no way the two of us could eat twenty fish. He fried up the fish in butter, and it was one of the best meals of my life! I have never been able to duplicate the flavor of that fresh trout fried in butter at a campground at the Kern River....or, at least my memory of it.  Actually, it probably wasnt butter, it was probably Blue Bonnet margarine.  :-)

But I dont think the butter was the secret ingredient. I think the secret ingredient was the special attention I received by spending the entire weekend with just my dad, and the pride I heard in his voice when he told those guys that his little girl caught her limit that day. I do still remember sleeping in the back of the truck, looking up at the stars and listening to the sound of the river that night.

That is one of my best memories of growing up. A year or two later, my dad took my younger sister deep-sea fishing. I dont want to discount all of the time and energy my mom put into raising us, and the special times weve had with her. But I think for a little girl to spend a weekend, a day, or even an afternoon with just her dad...its a really great experience and I think it does a lot for her self esteem. So, for any of you dads who have little girls, I encourage you to find some time to spend alone with your daughter, doing something that is special to the two of you. Im sure it will be a memory that she will always cherish.

Hmmm...I wonder if my sister has a special love of barracuda???  ;-)

There are no pictures of that trip (a camera was not in the list of necessities on that trip), but here are some fish-related pictures from my childhood.

I was about three here - "helping" my dad clean his fish

My mom, my sister and me in the mountains near Bishop, CA

Fishing with my sister

This ones not really from my childhood, but I like the picture.

My helper "cleaning" the brown trout I caught on the Arkansas River

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May 2014 Update

Ive still got five trout in the tank.  I threw a bunch of wildflower seeds in one bed, just to see what happens.  The plants have grown, but no flowers, probably due to the cold water temps.  Now that its starting to warm up, I expect the cilantro to grow a lot more quickly, and maybe I will get some flowers.  Because we dont have A/C and we heat mostly with a wood stove, the temperatures inside the house arent as constant as they would be with central hear and air, so the water temperature fluctuates with the seasons.

Instead of typing a bunch of stuff, this time I decided to just narrate the video.  Not sure if anyone can understand my mumbling over the sound of the water draining...

UPDATE:  After I uploaded this, I watched it and realized you probably cant hear anything I say, so heres a rough transcript:

Me: "Blah blah fish blah blah....I still have five fish....one is a lot bigger than the other.  Lets feed them.  They love dried meal worms....blah blah blah....
Here are the plant beds."
Cat in the backgroud: "meow."
Me: "In the left plant bed, I planted a bunch of wildflower seeds.  They havent produced any flowers yet, probably because the water is too cold.  Oh, that looks like some little flowers coming in.  In the right plant bed, I have some basil and cilantro.  And here is Armando, the fish keeper."

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Summer Update Mutant Plants!

Ive been really lazy about posting to this blog, so heres a quick update.

Fish - Poor fishes, you have such a bad fishy mommy...
As the weather got warmer, I failed to add water to the tank.  One day, the timing of the two grow beds filling with water, but not enough to trigger the syphon, aligned like a bad horoscope (does that even make sense?) and sucked up almost all of the water in the fish tank.  The fish were left in about four inches of dirty water, and seven of them died.  :-(
My son had been down there about two hours earlier and everything was fine.  Since the fish werent stiff from rigor mortis, I figured they were still safe enough to eat, so I ate them...and they were good!  Then, a few days ago, there was another floater, so I ate him, too.  I think Ive still got six or seven live fish.  Theyre probably about 10 inches long now.

Plants - In an attempt to reach real sunlight, my plants have been growing freakishly large leaves and stalks.  I cant find the picture, but one of my broccoli plants, which languished all winter, and grew a skinny little stalk about the size of a thin piece of yarn, suddenly took off and grew giant leaves and a stalk about the size of my thumb.  The weird thing is that the bottom of the plant was still the size of a piece of yarn, and was trying to support the giant thumb stalk.  I decided to take everything out and stick with lettuce and other leafy greens.  I transplanted the broccoli and a few strawberry plants in the garden outside.  I didnt expect them to do very well, and my low expectations were met the next day when a long heat wave hit and withered the plants that were used to 70 degree temperatures.  The broccoli plant is still alive, but the strawberries all withered and died.
One of the strawberry plants I pulled had some blossoms, which I didnt notice until I had already pulled them (actually, my husband noticed them and told me I should put them back in the indoor grow beds).  I replanted it indoors, expecting it to die from shock, but it continued to grow and has produced several berries.  One thing to note is that aquaponic experts recommend against planting flowering plants.  These strawberry plants were in the bed for about six months, so I didnt expect them to flower.  They were growing mutant-sized leaves, so I figured they would never have the energy to flower.  I would still go with the experts recommendations not to plant flowering plants, but it was kind of cool to get some actual fruit from these plants.  I tasted one the other day, and it was kind of bland tasting.  Even more bland than a supermarket strawberry.  I guess strawberries love to grow in real sunshine.  Dont we all?

Mutant Strawberries - The smaller berries in this picture are each about an inch long.  Note the gigantic leaf - some of the leaves are larger than the palm of my hand.  Kind of freaky for a strawberry plant.

Speaking of real sunshine, I did add grow lights a few months ago, trying to get a little more growth during the winter months.  Apparently, one of my neighbors saw the lights and told her daughter she thinks were growing...uh....an illicit plant which I shall not name because I dont want my blog to come up in the "wrong" kinds of google searches.  Anyway, I am currently under investigation for a clearance upgrade for my job, so I hope the investigator doesnt choose that particular neighbor to interview.  LOL  Of course, if she does, she is more than welcome to come over and see that all I have are legal, edible leafy greens and a mutant strawberry plant!  :-)

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A Fish Story

About a month ago, I decided it was time to get more fish.  I had cleaned out the tank, just in case there was any fish disease (even though I was 99% sure the fish deaths were due to user error) and cycled the tank. 

I made the trip to Liley Fisheries in Boulder to pick up 50 - 2"-4" rainbow trout.  Boulder isnt really too far from Colorado Springs, but going through Denver - AHH!!!  What a headache.  It seems more like L.A. every time I have to drive through there.  Although, at least when traffic stops in Denver, theres usually a reason for it.  It just might take you an hour to drive the ten miles to find out what the reason is.  Anyway, the point is that picking up the fish is pretty much a journey.

I arrived at Liley and the nice man there filled up my fish "tank" (trash can) with water, poured in the fish, and I was off.  I got about 3/4 of the way home when I decided to pull off the freeway and get a soda. When I pulled off, everything was fine until I pulled out from the stop sign.  Thats when I found out that I had not properly secured my cargo.  The barrel fell over, dumping all of the water AND the fish in the bed of the truck!!!  I went about a half mile and pulled into a Safeway parking lot.  The baby fish were flopping all over the bed of the truck.  I climbed into the bed, set the barrel upright, and tossed all of the fish into the empty barrel.  Even though I figured they would all be dead, I ran into the store (my pants were soaking wet with stinky fish water BTW), bought eight gallons of distilled water, ran back out to the truck and poured the water into the barrel.  At this point, I was thoroughly discouraged, and decided that I was going to give up the fish part and just do hydroponics because I couldnt handle another four-hour round trip to get more fish.

When I got home, I dragged the barrel out of the truck, trying to figure out what to do with it, when I noticed one little shadow moving around near the surface of the water. I started taking out dead fish and noticed that there were still several fish struggling, but still swimming and breathing.  I scooped the live fish into their new home, but judging by their appearance, I didnt expect them to survive more than an hour or two.  I had to take my son to youth group, so I changed and left, expecting to find a bunch of dead fish floating at the top of the tank when I got home.  When I got back home that evening, I was shocked to see fifteen fish swimming around the tank, looking nice and healthy.

One month later, those same fifteen fish are still alive and well.  At the time of my fish disaster, I would have been pretty happy if just one or two fish had survived, but to have almost 25% of the original 50 fish survive for at least ten minutes out of water, and survive the stress of the ordeal...that still amazes me!  My miracle fish are getting fat and sassy, as you can see in this video.  The water has been too cold for algae, so its a lot clearer than it was in the last tank.

On the plant side of the house, not much activity until lately.  Even though I added some fluorescent grow lights, the water and air temperature in the room were too cold.  The dog door in the room had a little strip of rubber around the edges that gets pulled off when the dogs come in the room.  For most of the winter, the "arctic" air from outside was blowing in through this gap in the door.  A few weeks ago, my husband replaced the dog door, so the room stays a lot warmer.  Plus, I think (hope) the sub-zero temperatures are gone for the year.    Here are some pictures of the plants.

Plants look a lot greener with the extra light - before, they were a sickly yellow color

Broccoli

Cilantro

 The beans below are a good example of how important temperature is when growing plants.  When I planted bush beans this summer, they sprouted in about three days, then grew like crazy.  I planted these several months ago.  It took 2-3 months just to see sprouts, and these have been about the same size for at least two weeks now.  Not that the water temperature is closer to 50+ Fahrenheit, I think the plants will start to grow.

Bush beans

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The End of the Rainbow The Demise of Fatty McFish

FISH
In two days, I will be making the trip to Liley Fisheries in Boulder to get a new batch of fish.  Fatty McFish is  (was) a big fish in a small tank, so it was time to make room for the tanks future occupants.

For me (and probably most people, as evidenced by this post), this is the least enjoyable part of aquaponics - "harvesting" the fish - but, it must be done.  I read a bunch of opinions on the most humane way to kill a fish.  I went with two ideas -
1 - put the fish in a bucket of ice water so its circulation will slow down
2 - smack it in the head with a hammer

Well....lets just say that I wont be doing the smack in the head with a hammer.  It didnt work after one smack...or two...or...Anyway, I think you get the picture.  Obviously, I didnt smack hard enough, but that fish had a tough head.  I ended up taking a sharp knife and sawing off the head.  Wish it had been faster.  Sorry, Fatty.  :-(

Next time I will probably use more ice in the ice water.  Or maybe try the method mentioned in the forum linked above and use clove oil in the water to anesthetize the fish.

At any rate, Fattys suffering is over and he will be dinner this evening.  He was pretty big.  I should have gotten a tape measure, but I was trying to finish it quickly, so well just have to take a guess at his length...looks like over 15 inches.  Actually, it was a "she," but we got used to calling it "him."

Fatty McFish

Heres a short video of him swimming in his tank last night.  BTW, the noise in the background is my dog drinking water.  Hes crazy like that.

PLANTS

Unidentified Growing Object - 

Last year, my husband planted a bunch of acorns to see if he could grow some oak trees.  The planters were sitting above my grow beds.  This spring, once it finally stopped snowing and the temperatures got above freezing, a strange woody plant sprouted in one of my grow beds.  Once the leaves got big enough to be identifiable, I realized one of the acorns must have fallen into the bed.  There is now an oak tree growing with my strawberries and cilantro.

The Mighty Oak

Coconut Husk (Coir) Planting Material

All of my plants in the grow beds end up with very shallow, weak roots.  My husband bought me some coir, made of coconut husks, to see if I can get a stronger root system.  Coir is being used in many places instead of peat moss.  When I soaked the blocks of coir, as instructed, I was a little worried because it just looked like a bunch of potting soil ending up in the water.  However, I put about an inch of the stuff in a section of one of my grow beds, and it seemed to hold together pretty well.  I planted a few basil and cilantro plants...and I think something else, but I cant remember what.  Well see if this allows them to establish better than starting out directly in the gravel.

Coir - 23 June

Sprouts in Coir - 29 June

Thats it for now.  I will post some pictures of the new batch of fish soon.  Hopefully this trip will be a little less...eventful than the last!

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