Your water may contain pathogens, and also contain lots of detritus that
contains pathogens and spores. I suppose it also may contain nitrogen and
other problem nutrients, fish medicines, etc. but I don't imagine you're
dumping high enough amounts of water for that to really matter. I would
suggest not dumping your water into the stream for the same reasons we
don't want to dump fish in: pathogens (particularly cysts and such in your
mulm) are likely to hitch hike in.
Your tank water is probably very high in nutrients -- like I said, I'm not
worried about your five gallons with so many PPMs of nitrogen and
phosphorous in the stream. But, these nutrients might be greatly
appreciated if you have any houseplants, or shrubs outside. Try using
this water for watering outside -- the plants will love it. That, and
you'll be cutting down your water consumption anyhow: sort of a grey water
recycling. :)
JW.
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