Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Yeah how much fertlizer do we flush every day.

I've heard it quoted that one person's urine for a year has enough fertilizer value to grow all the grain for that person for the year.

I'm not sure how much could be produced from all my pee as I think that would require quite a large system. I do know that about one urination from me per day saved for the barrel system seems to be more than enough to grow all the lettuce/salad greens for two of us and I can still see gravel so I expect that with a little more maturity, I should be able to grow much more. It has been the cool season which makes growing salad much easier outside here. Come hot season, I'll have to plant something else in the system.

3/8/2008 9:45pm
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 40
Temps have cooled off here since yesterday which was hot and humid, then we had storms and today the highs were in the 60s and tonights lows are supposed to be in the 40s.
I dosed 200 ml in the gurgle dripper and will hopefully manage to check readings tomorrow night but I'm in for several long days at work.

3/9/08
ammonia and Nitrite 0
dosed 200 ml in gurgle

3/10/08
Ammonia and Nitrite 0
dosed 200 ml in gurlge

Been working long days so only able to check the system with the flashlight.

3/11/08
I was home so late (not really that 10:30 is so late but when I have to leave the house at 4:50 am it is) that I only tested Nitrate on this system this time
10:30pm
Nitrate 80 I think

I dosed 200 ml again in gurgle dripper.

Looking like for this size system with the current level of plants in it. 200 ml seems appropriate.

So! A six-pack a day and you can feed the neighbours too?

LOL, wouldn't require a six-pack. Just bottling more than one pee a day. I've been known to more than fill a 500 ml bottle in one go. But I gotta save some urine for the Compost pile too.

LOL, they should pee to feed themselves though!!!!!!!!! Actually it is the electricity for the pumping that should be shared.

It's all good!

I reckon the local 24hr gym would be the ideal place for a peeponic system.
Think of the amount of free kinetic energy just going to waste.. fitness fanatics in general have a fairly good diet too.
Hook up the exercise bikes to water/airpumps and the loo to the growbeds

How funny would that be!!!!!!! The Gym surrounded by greenhouse with the growbeds and plants. Produce from the growbeds being mixed into salads, sandwiches and health drinks at the snack bar. Talk about designer fertilizer. Most health nuts are already taking all sorts of vitamin/mineral supplements. Might have to do some research into steroid uptake in the plants though.

Definitely need to have spinning classes and a nice big gravity tank to store up some of that kinetic energy for the slow times when no one is there using machines.

LOL: "No, really! I have no idea how the drugs got into my system! I thought it was just the healthy diet that doubled my muscle mass! I swear!"


Flywheels, gravity tank (is that a high or big water tank?) pumped when people are working: sounds like solutions for windmills, solar pumps, or other intermittent pumps as well. Sweeet! Only problem might be cost of a big tank.....maybe a small high tank for energy storage that runs a pump for the normal AP pump...maybe a pressurized tank.... Now you've gotten me started and I'm supposed to be doing bids!

Yes a high up tank (high enough to provide enough pressure) and big enough to provide enough flow for some estimated period of time. Or perhaps that stored fall could drive a ram pump to lift other water for the system.

Yes a tank up high is actually a common way to store water that is pumped by intermittent means like wind pumps or solar pumps.

I suppose some of the bikes in the pee ponic gym would need to be hooked up to charge battery back-up banks too.

Been kinda busy lately but just a quick note about how the dosing and readings are going.
pH 7.6 seems to stay there.
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0 (It did jump a little the other day when I washed the dosing bottle in the system before taking the sample.)
Nitrate climbing steadily I think It might even be approaching 160.

I have added some Iron supplement and I have potassium supplement but haven't used any yet.

Some stuff has been harvested from the system lately and I don't have much planted up in the top tank though I think the broccoli seedlings are about to take off. Some of my romaine lettuce is even kinda headding up which it has never done for me before.

I have some cucumber seeds started so I'll probably get some of them into each system.

Added some tiny cucumber seedlings.

The system seems able to handle 200 ml dosed in the gurgle dripper each day though the Nitrate is still climbing. I suppose I should not try upping the dose unless I get some lots of really greedy plants into the system.

Currently there are a bunch of broccoli seedlings in there that are starting to get past the slow tiny stage. They should be heavy feeders as they get big so long as the heat doesn't get em.

There is one little tomato seedling that has a couple sets of true leaves so hopefully that will take off soon. I don't expect the lettuce to keep up with the heat much longer so I need to find some more warm weather plants to stick in there.

Wondering about perennials........
Hum, perhaps some sweet potato in the half barrels. OH! Maybe some comfrey as they are supposed to be fast growing (currently not so of my ones in the ground as they aren't getting much fertilizer) though I don't know if the root system will give me problems in the barrel system.

3/16/08 about 12:45 pm

pH 7.6
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate ( I decided to dilute and measure x10 as I have heard that readings can be miss-leading as they aproach the top of the chart.) So I did this and the dilute reading still came out to 20 wow that means my actual nitrates are around 200!!!!!

I also just for grins used one of the science project kits to test for copper and Iron. Well all those tests came up 0. The expiration date on the re-agent tabs for the Iron are a couple years past due. I would expect at least a trace of Iron since I have dosed both systems with Iron. The big system probably shouldn't show much as I went with a weak dose there but the Pee Ponic system should be showing something so I think the test is faulty due to being past expiration.

It's been a while since I got many pictures up. Here are a few.

Kicking along well there TC...do you have a piece of shadecloth to protect the young'uns until they get established?


Edit
Disregard TC, just saw the pics on your other thread

Double Edit
then again, this is a different system so maybe it still applies