Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Okay, newbie here!

My system was looking great for a while. The leaves were looking a little yellow so I added Iron Chelates to the medium (as the packet said to pour on soil then water in) I figured the sustem would water in for me. It worked a treat, at this point the plants went nuts so my partner and I were very pleased with ourselves.
A few weeks later and same thing, yellow leaves, so i ask my partner to repeat the process. However instead of finding a clear patch of medium, he poured the contents of the watering can all over the top of the plants, thinking this was a great idea!!!

Now I am also to blame, I stood by as he did this, but I definitly had a frown on my face!

The result was that all the tender young basil, bettroot, lettuce and silverbeet leaves have deteriorated into mush! Yes within days we had decimated our lovely leaf crops! we were soooo looking forward to our lettuce too!

I was devistated and apart from being embarrased I figured I would reiterate the manufacturer's instructions but add some as well

"....dilute into a watering can and water the soil around the root zone, NOT ON TOP OF THE PLANTS FOOL!"

....can you tell the bit I added. I will recover from this set back though, but feel better if I can help deter just one other newbie from making the same mistake...
Indi

Thats the way, help share the knowledge.... New plants will come back fairly quickly now your system is pumping, and at least you'll never do it again...

Aww tough luck!
As these things dissolve rather well, I've always added to my sump, that way there are no plants to hurt.
Salt, seasol, iron, potassium, all go into the sump.

How do you add potassium? Or is it not such a problem if you use the BYAP fish feed?

Indi

We generally don't add much, a little seasol now and then if need be.. Ecorose is a safe fungicide that is potassium bicarbonate, that can be easy to add for potassium..

Some people add a banana skin... although you need to be sure that they do not spray chemicals on the skin...

yeah nana skins work, but you HAVE to add them to the gb, and not the sump

Yeah, that is a good reminder, you could just see me putting up another post about not clogging up the sump with banana skins can't you! lol

Thanks for the info guys!

I put some new seeds in for the lettuce but forgot I had some floating on the fish pond which still look great. So all is not lost!

YAY

Cheers
indi

Or just laying a banana ontop of a tender young basil plant....

Interesting though, because foliar feeding is often a great way to give plants a quick hit of trace elements - I once burnt the crap outta my plants with too much seasol in a foliar feed.

Foliar feeding might be a great way to feed plants, but you definitely have to make sure to follow the dilution carefully and don't go spraying the plants at noon on a scorcher day since almost anything will burn the tender leaves then.

Take heart, at least you didn't dump a load of iron pellets and smoosh the whole system

Yes, thankfully I have avoided a 'whole systam smoosh' soo far. But it is still early days, somethings tells me you speak from experience, THAT would have been a downer! Maybe if we do a whole heap of dumbarse things we could write an, 'Aquaponics for Dummies' book.

lol

Indi

what volume of iron chelate did you use?? i need to add some to my system but dont want to overdo it.
the packet says to dissolve 24g into 10L for 10sq meters, so for my 1M2 GB it would be 2.4Grams into 1L?? does this sound right

have trawled through all of the firums and cant find any info regarding how much iron chelate . .
cheers, Ben

I originally based the Iron I added on square footage. I've not gone to the point of like a heaping tablespoon in each large grow bed under the water inlet to dissolved into the bed as it gets watered.

Of course different products are going to have different dosing instructions due to varying strengths.

I put one spoon full (the spoon that comes in the Yeats brand box) per 1000L of FT water once a month until symptoms abate

Same Simo....