Water germs not decreasing?

[Miamikicchi]

I have a water lake with germs in it, connected to a water system. Germs in it are supposed to be decreasing in count and I've taken care to isolate water process that produces germs, lavatories for example, but the germ count keeps increasing. I have a few questions regarding this.

The water system only handles polluted water from carbon skimmers, yet the amount of germs in the clean water lake is rapidly increasing. It started out as polluted due me not knowing sieves transfer germs, but even after sitting for about 10 or more cycles, in some parts the amount of germs has just increased, from 10-20k to almost 200k. In other parts it's just as high or increased to 40k. Any ideas about what might be going on? The change rate is -10/s with a half-life of 20 cycles because it's clean water, but just looking at the germ count it's obvious that it's in fact increasing at speeds far in excess of even +10/s!

There are just under 200 germs in the water sieve for it. The sieve was rebuilt, never used for anything else and incoming pipes were empty at the time of building. Is this still causing a problem somehow? As a matter of fact, the water dropping into the lake from the input pipe seems to have considerably less germs than other parts of the lake, about 20k, and certainly very far away from 200k.

The germs in water pumped from the lake are measured in hundreds as well.

The water in the lake should be killing off germs at a sufficient rate, no? Yet, they just seems to be increasing, to alarming numbers even. I understand that germs are circulating to some degree, but that should not cause growth.

The air in the base is quite clean so I can't imagine that causing any of it. As for the air just above the lake, it's just carbon dioxide with no germs.

Attached is a picture of the business end of the water supply. Kindly disregard the germs shown in the air, as those are just a result of my very recent attempts at electrolysis.

[psusi]

My guess is that you are putting germ filled water into the carbon skimmer and it comes out as germ filled polluted water, which quickly breeds more germs before it is cleaned by the sieve.  Stop wasting power pumping fresh water into the carbon skimmer from the lake and venting it back into the lake; just make the output of the sieve feed right back into the skimmer in a closed loop.  That will also probably stop your germs from increasing ( in the lake;you will still be getting germ filled polluted dirt from the skimmer ).  Eventually they will die off but it will take like 50 cycles.  You may want to put a reservoir in a chlorine filled room and use that to kill the germs faster.

[Gurgel]

Also note that germs in water do not die off that fast, especially when it is at the perfect temperature for them.

[suxkar]

I agree with what was said and will only add this: considering the amount of germs you have, there is a source pouring germs directly into the lake. This means it's likely what @psusi said, but could also be that there is a small amount of polluted water somewhere on the bottom that cultivates and repopulates the germs continuously. If this is the case, removing the source is the only option. Note that, even then, for so many germs it will take quite a while for the water to become germless.

[TheDeamon]

Going to agree with the others above, either there is a tile of polluted water somewhere in the lake, or much more likely, you're continuing to add germ filled "clean" water to the lake, which is repopulating or even expanding the germ population faster than it is dying off.

It's why many of the strategies for clearing germs from water frequently involve multiple water reservoirs and some means of holding the water in said reservoirs until germ free. Once the reservoir is full, it stops receiving new germy water, and thus allows a chance for the germ population to die off. Chlorine Gas in the room greatly accelerates that die-off obviously, taking a process that could take tens of days down into something that is done in just a handful.

[psusi]

7 minutes ago, TheDeamon said:

Chlorine Gas in the room greatly accelerates that die-off obviously, taking a process that could take tens of days down into something that is done in just a handful.

I think it's more like 50 cycles without chlorine.  At least that's how long I remember it taking before they added reservoirs and I just made 2x2 disinfecting ponds.  With a reservoir and chlorine it takes only a few minutes.