Aquaculture Water Quality for Small-Scale Producers - Aquaculture and the Environment: A Shared Destiny - page 136

stratification, and it would be helpful if CO 2 is saturated on pond water (Wurts and
Durborow, 1992).
Other alternative is chemical treatment. The addition of quicklime, hydrated lime or sodium
carbonate will increase the alkalinity of the pond, dropping the presence of dissolved CO 2 in
water. Treatment calculations can be found on Hargreaves and Brunson, (1996). In the case
of intensive systems, CO 2 could be a problem. In this case, the addition of a degassing tower
is recommended (Summerfelt and Sharrer, 2004).
4. Conclusions
The processes involved in aquaculture water quality are affected by many variables and
they are generally complex. However, the driving forces involved in fish farms can be
controlled in order to increase fish productivity. This control involves learned skills to make
the right decisions to correct present problems and to prevent new ones.
In this chapter we had discussed extensively the theoretical foundations of fish water
quality, with emphasis on small-scale aquaculture correction techniques. As it can be seen,
physical, chemical and biological processes involved in the pond dynamics are strongly
related, and they can´t be considered as isolated phenomena. The understanding of these
processes can be useful to improve the final yields on the farm with the minimal waste of
time, energy and money. As a result, the sustainability of the protein production can be rise
and the negative environmental impact can be diminished.
5. References
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