Hello from south Georgia!

[swamp creek farms]

My PH so far has been around 7.0, I check it about every three days. It has been the same since I started.

I checked the rain water one day for the hell of it, it was around 5.5 - and the ponds I have are all around 6.

The concrete I used was from an old chicken house my family had on the farm about 100 years ago. It's been sitting in the woods for a long time. I changed the filter medium to plastic cleaning pads this morning. Some folks suggested using oyster shells, which would change PH. Since the oil spill in the gulf oysters are getting scarce around these parts.

[evie]

Last week I added a bio filter to the system. It seems to be working great so far. I made it from a couple 3 gal nursery pots, and a 5 gal bucket, with crushed concrete for a filter medium. Untill I find something else that will work better, any ideas ?

How about lava rock... I would be afraid of the concrete... could it have unhealthy chymicals in it?

[jackalope]

I would think that the lime and cement in the concrete wouldn't be too good for the fish, hair curlers, kitchen scrubbies, shower body scrubs, easter grass, baling twine, poly rope - almost anything that has a lot of surface area would be great! I buy those shower scrubbers from the dollar store, 5 for a buck ..... and when they get too dirty for you, just throw them into the washer, and they come out real nice, ready to go again! I buy enuff to refill while those in the washer get a chance to air out for a few weeks

When you buy lava rock, make sure it really is lava rock ...... most of what's sold today is not lava, it is actually a man-made clay product .... I bought some from Ace and it broke down in the growbed so bad, I had mud in the bottom of the FT and in the bottom of the GB (which caused it to go septic) .... also, with lava rock, you have to wash it several times to clean off the powdery stuff .... I'll never use it again for sure!

[badflash]

What he said...
Just plain old large gravel works fine. I don't think there is much in concrete that is harmful though.