Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi there everyone

My name is Zee and this is my little project . Welcome to the show!! I look forward to chatting and learning a lot as this unfolds.

To start off I had a window sill with a crappy ol view .. I had a couple of low light plants on the sill taking up space so it didnt look AS bad lol.. Heres what I started with ..


I had read online about "window farming" and column gardening/vertical gardening. It peaked my interest, so I did a bit more research. I decided I wanted to give it a shot and see if I could get anything to grow. I went ahead and started building what I needed to, out of what I had to make my first "windowfarm". The system was a drip based system using an air lift method with an 8$ air pump and a inflation needle (for basket balls etc) The nice guy at the hydroponic store also gave me a mother tomato plant he had from the previous season that was extremely healthy. I took a bunch of cuttings from her and rooted them for my initial test run of the system. Thats what you see in the next photo. The air traps water in the line and forces it to the top, and gravity does the rest


After watching 2 of my cuttings do really well I was inspired to figure out a way to have more space to grow. I was initially going to add two more columns for a total of 6 bottles. I still didnt think this would be enough for me and I didnt like the lack of access I had to the plants. This is when I stumbled upon Aquaponics .... I was hooked. I started planning and researching the cheapest way to do things on my own. This is when version 2.0 came to be ..


I was still in the very early learning stages and also still using the drip method for the time being. I started off just using the top bed and watched as my tom plants grew even more .. They have taken a serious beating. .. At this time I was looking for a reasonably priced tank and pump for the system as well as what else I wanted to grow .. Anyways .. back to the tank. I was on Kijiji one day (similar to craigslist) and saw an ad that had been posted 10 min before hand. 40gal unused tank for 15$. I replied to the ad right away. By the end of the day I was the proud owner of a new tank at one heck of a price. I didnt even haggle him haha.


Im going to take a break for a few min and Ill continue right on! Hope you enjoy the journey so far

This is a neat idea, I am keen to see how well it works.

I have a couple of old fish tanks......Hmmmm

Axe

Hi there! Thanks for stopping by

Alrighty .. So to continue where I left off. At this point I found a pump for 25$ reused some things I had around to put inside the tank and started adding water!


and with the curtain up!


The plants still had some shock from being transplanted but that was alright. I knew they were hearty ..Thankfully haha. I started with tomato cuttings from the mother, Thai basil from seed, garlic, celery.



Next it was time to cycle it for a few days .. which was super hard lol because I wanted to add fish right away!! Thats a nooooo go though. After what felt like foreverrrrr I added gravel and some green


and my first little fish


and the boss of the tank haha .. a rainbow shark


let me know if you guys have any questions .!!! I have one more post ill make soon thatll bring you up to where I am now Thanks for coming through!!!!!