Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Well, after seeing BatonRouge Bill's Black Soldier Fly Compost Bin, I decided to get off my bum and build one. TCL was nice enough to send me some larva. The pails cost me $5 each and are 2.5 feet in diameter. The ramps are bolted and siliconed on so I dont think they will move. I placed a .75 inch opening in the side. I hope that is big enough!

I set it up t his way so that the flies can land on the rim and walk in, the crack size is adjustable.

Fish grow so slowly when you watch them every day.. I want my fish to look like this

Use a macro lens... really close up

LOL, no I want them to be as big as my chest..

Well, my nitrates are at 10. Finally, some nitrates! I planted some salad mix of seeds and squash. It to bad it took this long for things to kick off. Theres not much I can plant now.

My pH dropped to 5, so I added a 16 oz cup of crushed oyster shells to a tank. Do you think that is enough?

DDM, I didn't have much luck controlling my pH with crushed oyster shells (from AgWay). I had a small bucket worth in about 250 gallons and it sat at pH 6.4 for 9 months or so. I'm curious to see whether you have better luck with them.

Think they're a longer term, slow process...

Maybe some Calcium Carbonate or Potassium Bi-Carbonate would have a more immediate affect.

Longer than 9 months?

Concrete (cured of course, like from demolished walls) seems to work much faster, but it's for those who feel safe about it. (Fish are sometimes reared in cement 'rings' - see the end of this page)

Did you use the shell grit in a bucket/sock etc dipped in the tank or in the growbeds among the gravel? Was water circulated though it adequately? I think the voids in the shell grit (if in a container/sock) may hold water at buffered ph levels, and that the rest of the tank water is not exchanged with this water unless you circulate water through it.

Two other explainations I could guess:
* Bacteria acidifying faster than the grit can dissolve/buffer
* Too much general dissolved salts already (general hardness) that the carbonates cannot dissolve? Don't know.

Today I was cleaning out the junk in the bottom of one of my fish tanks when I discovered there are baby fish! They were hiding around some small pottery in the tank. I counted about 20 at first but after trying to catch them I only got 10. So either the others were eaten or they made it back to mothers mouth. Whatever the case, I have a female!!

Congrats Dan. I found the same thing when I cleaned one of my tanks.. Watch your fish so see if any of them have dark mouths and other dark spots and are agressive to anything that gets close to it. I just noticed that in one of my tanks with 3" fingerlings... Boy these things start early....

There was one with real dark patches staying in the large flower pot. I thought it was a male, but perhaps the female just took over. I'm very happy to have more babies!

That's the one Dan. I have one just like it right now. Staying in the pot and keeping all the others away. That's a female with eggs!!! Looks like your going to have a hatchery after all!!

How's your pH doing? I've got washed sea shells all through my system and can't get the pH down if I wanted to. I'm buffered at 7.6 which is higher than I really want but I'll have to live with it for this system. Anyway, there is a place around here that sells gravel and rocks (mostly for decorative purposes) that has washed shells. I was just thinking that if there is a place like that around you, perhaps you could get several bucket fulls of the shells and place them strategically so that the water from your system is forced through them. (say perhaps bags or buckets placed so that the outflow from your grow beds flows through the shells or perhaps where the water enters the fish tanks.) Of course you could probably also do this with the shell grit. You just need to have some small buckets to hold the grit and let the water from the grow beds drain through the grit into the sump. You really need good circulation of water through the shell grit in order for it to work on all your water rather than just a little water that actually touches it.

My pH has moved from 6 to perhaps 6.2. I would like to see it at 6.8 or so. I see no sign of the pH changing any more that that.. I am going to have to find something I can get locally to raise the pH. Was there lime or something sold in the pickling section of the super market?