The wet lab facility is a 1,600 ft² facility with concrete floor and floor drains located behind the Controlled Environmental Research Building on Farm Avenue (about 1 block from Ag Hall). It has been configured with filtered water, electric, air, and chilled water lines suspended from the ceiling for maximum flexibility in tank layout.

 

14 GPM carbon-filtered water systems provides chlorine-free water for filling tanks and is use to create flow-through systems. Water line spiggots are arranged every 5' along 3 lines to provide water throughout the wetlab room. Air for tanks is produced by a 1 hp SweetWater S41 regenerative blower, capable of producing over 70 cfm of air flow. This provides a high-volume, low-pressure air supply allowing ample aeration for all tanks even when they operate at different water depths/pressures.

 

The lab uses a heat exchanger connected to the university's chilled water line to provide the ability to cool tank temperatures with thermostatically controlled cooling coils. With this systems we can drop the temperature of a 650-gallon tank about 15oF below the ambient temperature. Heating tanks is accomplished with thermostatically-controlled submersible electric heaters. Waterproof ground-fault protected outlets are hanging overhead to provide safe electricity for heaters, pumps, filters, etc.

 

Tanks

650 gallon blue polyethylene tanks (6.5' diameter x 34" deep; TP655). These can be configured with or without standpipes through a side bulkhead.

 

200 gallon blue polyethylene tanks (4' diameter x 29" deep). These tanks are configured with center standpipes. Glass aquaria are also available in 10 and 20 gallon sizes for working with smaller fish or when being able to observe the fish from the side is important.

 

2,500 gallon pools (12' diameter x 3' deep) are used when large numbers of big fish must be held. These pools have a motorized filtration system that we have modified to allow a standpipe to be used, so they can be setup as a flow-through system or used as a closed recirculation system.

 

Meters and Electronic Equipment

LaMotte 2020e portable turbidity meter, has four ranges to cover turbidities from 0-4,000NTU.  Can run on AC current in lab or battery in the field.  Hach Model 18900 ratio tubidimeter is use in the lab.

 

YSI 556 Multimeter with 20m cable.  Simultaneously measures dissolved oxygen, pH, conductivity/salinity, temperature, and ORP and has a built in barometer to automatically adjust for atmospheric pressure.  Internal memory can store over 49,000 time & date stamped data sets. YSI 610-D with 600 XLCE-25-O multi-parameter probe simultaneously measures dissolved oxygen, pH, conductivity/salinity, temperature, TDS, pH, ORP, and depth.  Internal processor can automatically record and store data for later download to PC.

 

Various meters and test strips are available to monitor water quality (pH, chlorine, nitrate, nitrite, ammonia, etc.). The lab contains several scales/balances that cover different weights from 10 mg to 23 kg (up to 58 lb). Larger scales are available through our partnership with the Oklahoma Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit.

 

Miscellaneous Equipment

A variety of different sizes of pumps (1-12 gpm) are used for recirculation/filtration systems with fiber media and/or zeolite ammonia remover. The lab has multiple high-capacity (20 - 85 gal/min) pumps to speed tank draining or moving water from one tank to another. The lab also contains a variety of sizes of dipnets, air stones, water hoses, air hoses, thermometers, and chemicals for fish disease treatment.

We have an upright freezer and a freezer-refrigerator unit used for storing samples.