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:
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| A group of black ants collectively planning out how to dissect this piece of flesh |
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| No ants on this one |
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| 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 couldn't 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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