ABSTRACT
The Southwest desert of the United States is characterized by arid climate and limited availability of freshwater. In future applications to treatment of wastes generated by saline water catfish culture, the submerged filter has good potential for being used to optimize water usage and minimize ammonia toxicity to the fish. Combining the results of water quality characterization with fish weights at the times of sampling generates unit nutrient production data. A hydraulic loading rate of 18.9 m/day was found to be acceptable for a submerged upflow filter nitrifying a high salinity wastewater. The upper limit on salinity for overall success of culturing channel catfish using saline groundwater from Roswell, NM is 5000 mg/L total dissolved solids (TDS). Speculation as to which specific ions inhibited nitrification at a TDS level above 5000 mg/L was difficult because of the complex makeup of the saline water.
