Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Happy Birthday!

With the weather we're expecting I doubt you'll forget this birthday in a hurry...

The guy next door asked if he could put up a ladder on our side of the fence to clean his guttters just before it started.

He was about to put up the ladder there was a huge flash followed almost immediately by huge thunder.

We all agreed his gutters were fine and he was home within 30 seconds

I love it.

I really miss it from my time in Papua New Guinea when it was the main form of nightly entertainment.

Things are a bit slow at work lately. I was thinking I should get a book. But then I visited the BYAP forum and got back to this thread. So this is what page 211 looks like! I'm around page 50.

I must share how offensive I find sporadic randomness, most acronym references and the off topic posts. I'm learning about bacon recipes and baking bread, not AP. I can't wait to read the rest.

I've learned so much from the likes of you BW, as well as Faye and TCLynx that I would like to share my system and experiences in another thread, but it's hard to follow the likes of you three with anything that might be considered interesting.

I will try though because I have some unique challenges in my system as well as ideas from others that I modified to my circumstances, etc. Now I'm finally at a point (2 systems in 2 years) where I don't normally rush home from work and address the immediate threat to the survival of my fish, I might actually be able to post photos and info between projects.

It's amazing how a small change can create an imminent death situation and many hours worth of corrective action. But more on that later, I wouldn't want to hijack this thread or drift off topic...

So just a few random interjections here. My apologies if this has been covered somewhere between page 72 and here.

I recommend avoiding citric acid as it is anti-microbial and will have a negative affect on your bacteria - something like death which I'm pretty sure is undesirable.

I also avoid Hydrochloric (Muriatic) acid as it is a dangerous chemical and a very strong acid - save if for your swimming pool and maybe disposing of bodies or similar.

I recommend phosphoric acid as it is a mild food safe acid (used in most soft drinks to provide that "bite"), and phosphorous can be beneficial to your plants.

I think there are a few other points I was gonna share too, but my brain is full of other things right now.

Oven cleaner works better!

carbon tetrachloride I believe...Good to know, thanks!

I cant remember what thread it was but I did a few experiments with charcoal as an acidifier.

I think I used a Cuttlefish ...spine (internal crunchy bit that you find washed up on beaches and that you feed to birds in cages as a source of calcium) as a method of changing ph to bring it back down (same as shellgrit)

Then charcoal again to acidify it.

It may or may not be useful

searching ...

here its..

http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=7430&hilit=cuttlefish+charcoal#p230327

I dont think I've read even one thread on BYAP where I failed to learn something or be entertained.

Much more than half the content of this thread is other peoples content. I hope this thread continues long after I'm dead and buried

This is my happy place. Even when dead

I'm a member/lurker/participant in a stack of different forums, and this is by far my favorite community. Largely due to the free exchange of ideas, and general generosity and decency of folk.

See this thread for an example of a free exchange of ideas...

http://www.backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=22607

Awesome

Agreed. I love this forum and I've learned incredible things here over the past two years or so. I've already been reading about controllers / arduino including that thread. Great stuff. Just think, only 3 million or so more pages and I'll be all caught up!

I definitely see improved electronic and programming skills in my futer. Now if I could just find a copy of "How to learn C++ programming and be really good with impossible code in 15 minutes or less," I can move forward.

Thanks for all your contributions BW and your 120 things blog - I love that stuff. You have GREAT ideas, thanks for sharing. I'm starting to post info about my system and my journey, so hopefully I can share some lessons with others too.

MIT OpenCourseWare teaches every topic in the Universe for free (yep, the Universe) even this starter for C++ (they also have more advanced courses)...

https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-computer-science/6-096-introduction-to-c-january-iap-2011/

Yes, even with 200 million visitors (or however many they tout now) over the past 15 years, that has got to be one of the most valuable and underutilized and unknown resources in the Universe as we now know it. Perhaps self driven study is not for everyone, but I live on a volcano on the edge of the jungle a million miles from fine institutions of higher learning and I envision 1000's of learners out there in the middle of nowhere like me that effectively have access to some of the best educational resources known to mankind for free!

Who knows how many Einsteins grew up and lived a full life as a ditch-digger in some outback podunk village because they didn't have access to higher learning?

For example, this course has greatly enhanced my understanding of siphons:

Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences » Introduction to Fluid Motions, Sediment Transport, and Current-Generated Sedimentary Structures (yeah, right!)

Surely we are on the verge of some quantum leaps for mankind...

--
Sam

I can't BELIEVE that didn't show up in my Google searches for bell siphons. C'mon Google, REALLY?!!!!!

Bullwinkles not doing so bad himself, 204,000 people have visited his little AP thread to see what he's up to!

Dont believe stats.

Many of my posts are only one word for instance.

So the page count is total nonsense.

And anyone that follows this thread will see that there's new content and might want to read it only to find it's a post with just the word "again!" or something.

If you look at a page like this...

memberlist.php?mode=&sk=d&sd=d

You'll see that every one of those listed (and many more) has soooo much more actual information than this thread.

But that probably wont stop me

Actually it's probably time I contributed something. It's been a while.

Some time ago, I moved my system from a place in direct sun in a corner flanked by a tin fence, and a tin roller door. It's now in the shade of my house, under black shade cloth so it's not doing a lot.

So little in fact, that I planted a Maidenhair fern in the growbed because I thought it might be the only thing that would grow....



It's doing pretty well.

But it turns out I have yet more aquaponics content!

Mrs Bullwinkle has taken a liking to Leeks so has been buying them from a supermarket.

They cost quite a bit for not a lot if you're using them as an onion substitute, so I thought I'd stick the cut-off bottom end into the growbed, and sure enough it started to grow...



This thing (temporarily pulled up for the photo and pictured with two others at different stages or regrowth) had to grow roots before it started to grow above ground, so I'm guessing when it comes time to harvest, if I leave the roots on, and leave 1cm of stem, it should grow much faster having an established root system and all.

Bam!

Content

That is something I haven't stumbled across before in my travels on the interwebs. Thanks Bull. Book marked for the next rainy day, or hot day, can't tell what will be next...