Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Be careful, Marc, it's a jungle out there! A very healthy looking jungle, too, I might add.

LOL PLJ
Next time I take a picture I'll try and get a shot of the 'roos looking through the fence at the vegies.
You would know what it is like to co-exist with nature out where you are.
Have you kept your vegies safe?

... and some more kale in the blue barrels.
The shade cloth is to keep the sun off the barrels as they have the capacity to add a lot of heat into the system on sunny days. Once the shade cloth went in the water temperature dropped significantly on days of the same temperature. On sunny days the water on the side of the barrel facing the sun was very warm. Ok during winter and early spring but from now on it's not so good until the trout are out.


some of the red and green cabbages. Ok so you can only see the green cabbages but there red ones are there There is also the massive Silverbeet. The leaves are so large that if Adam had used them instead of a fig leaf he could have made a 3 piece suit and still had some left over for Eve.


and some more.

The damage on the cabbages is in my view caused by a trace element deficiency that occurred when I was doing a lot of water changes in early September. It was much worse in the blue barrels where there were no/very little solids. (It is all good now but looks unsightly.) That would indicate that there are nutrients that are in the bed, and not the water, that the plants can access. Newer systems are more prone to it than older systems. All the water used is rain water so there are no significant nutrients entering the system other than what I put in. There is a photo a few pages back that show 3 Ceylon spinach plants, one with a deficiency and another without and the other in between. All were growing in the same bed a foot or so apart.

PS despite all this greenery my nitrates are still rising

Cabbage White Butterfly is the only predator seen feeding at my GBs thus far, Marc. The 'roos have plenty of green pick elsewhere for the time being, and after that goes they are likely to move in on my irrigated bamboo groves before eventually discovering the bounty of the GBs. Some fencing will be in order before then, I reckon. I probably have until Jan to get organised with it.

veggies look amazing Marc, are you having any issues with your Kale and the dreaded white butterflies? I can't keep the caterpillars of my Kale and Bok Choy, despite checking leaves daily and spraying with Depel every week,

Lloyd

Hi lloyd no major problems with caterpillars despite there being clouds of diamond back moths coming in from the canola crops out east. I have been spraying with Dipel but this is one of only a handful of pests that have become resistant to BT so I also use Spinosad from time to time but so far this season I have not had to use it. Fingers crossed.

Had another dip in the trout tank today and pulled out 4 nice sized trout.
sizes were 758gms and 380 mm, 805gms and 385 mm, 791gms and 380 mm, 1024gms and 400mm.




SWMBO filleted them again and they are just as orange as last time. I have only been feeding them 50% 7mm and 50% 5mm pellets so they don't seem to need a pure diet of 7mm pellets to colour up the flesh.

Dude, you grow some good trout. Very impressed Marky

Thanks Charlie, not so fat this year but still fatter than i would like.
next year i will grow the same number of trout but in a 3000l tank that's 100 l per fish to live i and over 200 l per fish in total.
ps I'm now a consultant

Congrats on the upgrade mate.... Ive always wanted to meet an AP consultant.

Heh Marc, you're just the man - I was thinking about starting off a commercial system using a 20L bucket and a seedling tray. How many fish do you think I can stock?

Great growth - I've got a similar problem trying to keep nitrates down and finding creative ways to use silverbeet.

You'll be needing a container to mount all that hardware, give me a call to arrange a consultation for your container selection

despite all that growth my nitrates are still increasing and that is with about 25 trout (that are left). I don't know how those numpties that stock large numbers of trout with less growbeds manage to control their nitrates at all or they simply don't feed as much. I would much rather have a few big fish that a lot of small fish (less waste).
Try some kale as well next year as it grows like mad and must be using a heap of nitrates. Mine grow far bigger than my silverbeet.


Great idea Matt, just send me $200 cash and I will tell you how to make thousands out of your new endeavour. Just check out my fish and veggies. You too can do that. It is all so simple and much easier with me on board guiding you all the way . And for a $100 more I can supply the bucket and seed tray. Groan

Thanks Marc - had Kale this year too - Have trouble convincing my wife to eat it though - she seems to think it tastes 'strong' Did do a few rounds of kale chips though which were tasty and not filling!

Had Broad beans this year, though they don't chew on the nitrates much. I think lots more brassicas is the way to deal with winter nitrate excesses (thats my plan for next winter....)

Cheques in the mail - can you send me those special bacteria ASAP

I don't think that kale is as strong as cabbage and would rank it with broccoli leaves. Apart from the smoothies we stick it in stir fries, spagbol, any stew, soup etc (and even raw). If it is as good for you as they say it can't hurt to get it into you at any opportunity. I gotta do what I gotta do to make up for all that alcohol and lung darts of my mis-spent youth . The fact that it is so healthy for you and its capacity to grow well means that it has to be a staple in our house. When the kids complain I just tell them they are taking one for the fish

The Broad beans are a legume and have the capacity to fix their own nitrogen from the air. The beans I grew had nitrogen fixing nodules on their roots but not as many as those grown in the soil but that could have been because it was the first year I grew beans.

I gave up trying to reduce nitrates through plants and did water changes this year (the tanks were overflowing so I just put it to a good use). That worked. The plants are just slowing down the increase until the end of the trout season.