Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Hi guys, I have set up a little system a couple of weeks ago, my main concern are the roots on the strawberry plants. I have read a lot online about black root rot, but this all seems to center around soil and not aquaponics. Here are some pictures, maybe someone would have seen something similar before and have some advice for me. The bean plant picture is just there to illustrate the root differences. I suspect there are also some nutrient deficiencies which I would appreciate any advice on too, but the main thing for now is keeping the strawberry plants alive

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It looks like you need more filtration.

are you just pumping water from your tank to NTF? Could you mabey show us some more of your system?

Will take more pics in the morning, I have a home made filter, made of some sponge, 2 layers one wrapped in a stocking. And lots of kitchen scourers fastened to the submersible pump (if that makes sense). I will have a look to see if solids are making their way into the pipes but I doubt it, iv been looking into the pipe daily and all I have definitely seen is abit of washed up sand from the roots after transplanting, but I may be wrong. Would solids cause the roots to sort of rot? They are disintegrating when I touch them.
Thanks again

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I'm with joblow.

I use a similar pipe system and the roots end up looking exactly the same. They do end up rotting and the plant dies.

I get around the problem by using the pipes for fast growing plants like lettuce and things that don't seem to mind the sludge (watercress and marigolds for example). By the time the lettuce roots have collected too much sludge, I'm eating their leaves.

If you're confident your filtration is working, could it be low oxygen in the water? I can't see if you have nft or a sort of (shallow) deep water culture in those pipes.

Ok, a few things have been raised that could be the issue, I have been building my system almost as I go, so the filter has been getting updated and it wasn't the best at first, so perhaps that has contributed, I believe now that that issue should be sorted, but I won't rule it out totally. Initially I wanted an nft style system, however at the moment I'd say its working more like a shallow dwc. I'm waiting for some taps to arrive, and this will allow me to accurately control the flow of water I'm hoping. Here are some pictures.

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I have some questions and a comment or two.

What is in the pot? I see the expanded clay on top is it the same all the way to the bottom or is there a mix?

Looking at the roots, the bean plant looks like it has algae clinging to the roots but the pics of the channel don't show any, am I missing something or is this something other than algae? Could a lot of the dark mass on the strawberries be algae?

The strawberry plants look pretty leggy like they aren't getting enough sunlight.

How old is this system? It looks like you might have a potassium deficiency which is pretty common in AP (potassium bicarbonate or potassium sulfate are OK for use on strawberries but don't use potassium chloride to treat this - strawberries are sensitive to the chloride ion). I usually spray apply seaweed extract since Maxicrop contains 2% potassium - for really needy plants I'll spray apply potassium bicarbonate at a rate of 1 tablespoon per gallon of water. For what it's worth, if you do have some form of root rot you could have all kinds of nutrient deficiencies but they might not have been the problem in the first place.

If your filtration wasn't or still isn't working, the roots of the strawberry plants may have become coated with suspended solids, basically smothering them. I don't see much of anything in your channels but you could try rinsing off the roots and then putting them back in just to see if it helps.

I'm not to keen on the water flowing through the metal mesh back into the tank. Does the metal have a zinc coating? You might eventually run into fish problems as others have found.

That's all I can think of for now, hope it gives you some ideas to work from .

The proven pathway to learning aquaponic production has been a simple fish tank and gravel growbed combination .

I would suggest starting with this and adding on your nft and or deep water culture at a later date once you have a balanced and fully cycled system

NFT and Deep water systems require highly polished water and sufficient oxygen and nutrients

Aquaponic systems are like building a veg garden in our gravel driveways there is no immediate nutrient base

These take time to build up using quality feed and addition of some trace elements depending on crop type

Ive found Strawberries Capsicums and Corn my biggest challenges over the last 6 yrs

Success breeds confidence so grow some easy plants while your learning

Your system doesn't appear to have a biofilter , this is a must have if you want to grow hungry plants such as tomatoes strawberries you will need the biofilter capacity and the fish load to feed them .

Any fish waste solids in your tubes will cause you trouble

If you want to keep going with what you have , run the fish tank water through a coarse and then a fine gravel bed into a sump and pump from there

hi guys i think i have the same problem with my strawberry plants

Terra made some good points. I see you do have some bio-filtration. I'm not sure the bio-filter is adequate (but then I don't know how many fish, the size or the fish and how much you are going to be feeding ) - are you taking ammonia, nitrite and nitrate readings? These readings will give you an idea of how well the bio-filter is actually working and whether it's cycled yet. You may want to post up some information on what the filtration media is, how many fish and of what type you plan on adding. People here are pretty good about giving feedback on whether they think it will work out and what you should consider changing.

Cheers

Thanks guys, I doubt the stuff on the roots is algae, the reason for this is my system is only a couple of weeks old max 5 weeks, and the first lot of strawberries started suffering almost immediately, first sort of drooping as a result of poor water supply then all this mess. My system was meant to be a small test to see if I would enjoy aquaponics before actually spending some decent money on a system that can provide fish and some veg for the family, and since my daughter loves strawberries I thought I'd give that a go first. So to answer the question of my system setup, I have a 35galon tank with 4 goldfish in it, the sump/bio filter is about 15 maybe 18l if I'm lucky I'd say. The idea behind this was first to not drain direct from the tank so if anything went wrong I wouldn't immediately kill the fish, then obviously for bio filtration. This is achieved by kitchen sponges, about 30 of them in one side of the sump, and about 100 bio balls off amazon. Then for a little bit of mechanical filtration I added the black sponge in 2 layers, one in a stocking (ladies tights) to try and catch as much muck from going into the pipes. I also have a solids lifting overflow from the tank to the sump. I have 13mm pipe going from the sump up to the pipes, where I have the first T, one simply returns to the tank, my idea here was to circulate as much water as I can between the tank and sump/filter, while the other leads to another T piece, which feeds each pipe. The pipes are 64mm PVC with 50mm holes drilled in them about 20 cm apart if my memory serves me correctly. The pots are regular cheapies with bigger holes cut in them for the roots to escape and are filled with clay balls all the way to the top so there is nothing else in them. To start my system I used what is called safe start here and stress coat, stress coat to remove any chlorine or chloramine from the water and safe start to start the bacterial colony going, I set this up and left it overnight before popping to my local let store to buy my first 2 goldfish as I'd read cycling with fish is possible and is quicker than without so I figured the fish are cheaper than bottled ammonia anyway. Turns out I managed to pull it off, and as I'd kept fish a lot as a kid I felt that part was a no brainer. I must admit that my filter was not always as it is now, as stuff has been arriving by post and Iv been adding to it as the stuff arrives. Some good news is my taps arrived today so Iv fitted them and slowed down the water to the pipes. For water quality I have been taking readings about twice a week give or take. Ammonia was high the first time I tested, I panicked and did a water change, this was about 4 days after adding the fish. My pH at the time was at 7, which has now risen to 8 and been sitting there consistently since. Nitrite is sitting consistently at the lowest my kit will read, I think its 1ppm. Nitrate is at about 50ppm and ammonia is currently reading zero. I have all the readings taken written down so can get them up for about the last 5 maybe 6 reads. And that's my system in a nutshell. I have always washed the roots in a liquid seaweed solution of about a capful in 10 litres of water when transplanting all my plants. And sprayed them with it about 3 days when I read that it contains potassium, and added about 4 capfuls to the sump as I'd also read this doesn't hurt. But I was worried about adding too much.

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Personally I'd can the strawberries. Temperamental things, I've never been a great fan of them in AP systems.

Yep Strawberries are micro climate sensitive , if its too hot , too cold , too windy , wrong ph , not enough bees it goes on and on .

I grew great strawberries at my last place , here the season is so short its not worth growing them in aquaponics they tie up too much space for no return

Having said that I found a spot by accident that worked well in a big pot so this year a large raised bed in that location under the shade cloth on the western side of house .

If you have large commercial strawberry growers near you this is the best guide to persevering with them .