Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

looking good!

thanks
aug 5 I tested the system the first time, Amonia was at 0.50 Nitrte 0.25 Nitrate 0 PH 7.6
Our water has a natural ph of 7.6-7.8

Today 11th Amonia 0, because of the ammonia tablets I used, the Amonia was killing the goldies.
Nitrite at 2 Nitrate at 5 and ph at 7.6
goldie keel over rate down to 1 every 3 days.

Goldie keel over rate is down to 1 in a week. The Grapes and the citrus are doing very well. I have to get a climbing rack for the grapes. Some of the strawberries have a hard time, but they were already very stressed, had some kinde leave thing, made them look brownish, fungus ?
The rest is doing ok. Got a Whitefly problem and have no idea how to get ridd of it.
PH:7.6, Nitrite:0-.25, Nitrate:8, Amonia:0
What does that mean ?

The Tilapia are still in an aquarium type tank, 75g. I had just 2 buy the aquarium, they are fish so they can't buy the farm. They are canibals and ate half of the dead ones.
Since I have hard time to keep the water above 75, they eat slow and little, they should have 80 plus.
That has to wait till they move into the old Bunkhouse.

It has been running now for 4 weeks and some. Despite all my mistakes, it seams that the system is working fine. The Grape has grown more than a foot and has developed some fruit. The Goldies are growing and are always hungry. I feed 3 times a day if possible.
We had the first touch of winter, in AUGUST, brrrrrrr, the La Plate mountains had their first snow, down to 10 000 feet.
El Nino is at 65%, down from 85%.

The bunk house is nearly all emptied and cleaned up. Te cleaning was the biggest thing. I t had not been used for 7 years and had developed a nice mouse population.
I got a rubber maid 300 gallon tank for just about $200. I like those they are stought, made for cows and horses.
Than I checked with Stone, how they can get me stoned. It turns out they can do that very well. They have bulck cinder, 3/4 - 1 inch size, $70 a ton.
On my way home I stoped bt the nursery and got all their Strawberries of the bargain table, 12 for $5, in good health and the grapes were on sale, too, so I got 4 of those.
That should get the bunk house ops started.
I plan to built the grow beds out of 2x8s and than use liner. They will be on wheels and forkliftable, so they can be easily moved around and brought outside.

I have to check the other nursery for citrus, I am not to happy about that one, because their greenhouse has a lot of pest from white flies to spider mites and everything in between.
I like to try a couple of orange trees.

I might built the grow beds this weekend.
Next week is going to be tide, have to bring the hay in

This just to be the common room of the bunk house. It is 20 feet by 17 feet and will become Tilapia home.
It is heated and well insulated.
I had completely forgotten about the hole, since it was covered by a cabinet. Luckily I took the cabinet out.
Over the last 20 years, it must have filled with water, every spring, when the snow melted. The water marks on the wood showed it.
The Hydrant still works, which is excellent. I will plum it so I have a faucet, it goes to the cistern of the building.
But the wood in the hole is rotten and since the water seeps into it, it has to be filled.
It took 40 wheel barrows of construction sand. I will seal it with a 4 inch concrete pad.
The 300 gallon tank will go in that corner.

The cistern gets only used in the winter, it provides the water for the horses, heated waters.
When I checked the hydrant, yaiks that water smelled bad. There must be a dead mouse or two, or three in the cistern.
Have to clean that one out.

got the hole filled and sealed with concrete.
I still had this 75 gallon water trough, so I built a pallet for it with casters, I can roll it around on concrete and use the traktor forks to move it around outside if I want.
I have one more of those troughs, it is right now the Tilapia nursery

I will built a second grow bed out of 2 bys and line it. It will have a forklift pallet with casters, too.

All grow beds for this set up can not be wider than 30 inches, other wise they will not fit through the door.

This is now round 2.
The black tank is the ft, 350 gallon, the right hand gb is 200 gallon, the left hand 75 gallon
I flushed the system for 1 week and than planted strawberries and grape, they were sale.
I let that one run for a few days and than started to spike it with tee, tee time.
The tee is urin, Llama manure and some horse manure, should I have added some lime or sugar.............

The Starbucks Special.


Amonia has come up and I wonder how high I should push it.

Naturally ph is very high, our water has a 8.

Yesterday I got 2 blue barrels for free, they will be added.

Now I have to add lights.

Since I am adding to my solar I had to dig some foundations and while I had the backhoe up here I did a little digging for a trout pond, which will be next springs project.

Number 2 will run without fish till mid October, I have to go to Europe for 11 days in October.


Still fighting white flies in the indoor garden.

something started

Now things are changing big time.
Amonia and PH have not changed but Nitrite is going through the roof and Nitrate is coming up, too.
I guess I will see what happens till the week end, before I add more tea.
I hung lights today and will give the plants for a week a 24h treatment. Than I will use a timer 12 on 12 off.

System 1 is doing well, despite the white flies, but the brocolie and caly have taken a serious beating. I guess they will have to go.
The peppers are starting to bloom again and some had fruit which are ready for harvest. Have not lost one Goldie in 2 weeks.

The Tilapia for system 2 have tripled in size, no losses since the first week.

Chemestry in system 2 is changing rapidly.
PH is unchanged but Amonia is now down to zero, Nitrite is still high and Nitrate came up again

Getting from ammonia to nitrites is relatively quick. The bacteria that convert nitrites to nitrates take longer to develop. This is the hard part of cycling.

Should I add more of the Tea to get ammonia up again ?

Or wait

Wait. Like I said this is the hardest part. After putting things together and what not, we feel like we should DO something. Resist that temptation.