Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Well I caved in and decided to buy my 1st aquaponic system.

Bought an IBC setup from backyard aquaponics, plus a few extras. Decided to have a hack at making my 1st IBC GB. As you can see from the photo, there was a little fight with the angle grinder and the side of the IBC causing a little bit of loss on one side!

Nevermind; a bit of adjustment to the height of the siphon and there was no more overflowing media/water.

Planted out all my vegies, and will cycle the system for about a week before chucking the fishies in. Going for low maintenance so will probably go for the silver perch first up. Thinking about 15 silvers into the FT.

Looking forward to the amazing growth!

Looks great !!

Nice work, you didn't waste any time

Well I wanted to get out in the sunshine to help get rid of my cold!

Coriander apparently really hates being transplanted; I've already lost half of them

Bought five silver perch fingerlings and put them in the FT. They hid underneath the pump for most of the 1st day, but tonight they're swimming around near the surface, so I'm guessing that's a sign they're a little happier.

No nitrates or nitrites present as yet, but with 5cm fingerlings I don't expect much atm. Sticking with constant flood too to help bacteria populations settle in and keep the FT aerated.

Exciting times!

I've had those fights with the angle grinder too! One of my growbeds is a little on the lesser side of level workmanship... but if it still works... Took about 4 weeks recently to cycle my new system.

looks great.. i had some similar fun with ibc's too.. lol

Hope to back home soon to take an updated snapshot of the growbed. Can already see on my security camera's that the vegies are starting to take off.

Fish are happy - never to be seen, but eating their food ( from what i've been told! )

I can already see the tell-tale sign of ripe tomatoes on one of my transplanted heirloom tomatoes, and the spinach appear to be going great.

Sucks having to wait to see the progress in the flesh!

11 days of growth later..

There is already quite a bit of difference in the growth for a new system. I bet it was good to be back and see it for real Giraffiti?

Yep sure was!

I've had to swap out some dying seedlings with some new one's, plus I've bought a couple of goldies to help power the whole thing along.

Haven't had any ammonia readings over 0.25ppm. pH still around 7.6. Chucked in some iron chelate today as the spinach is showing signs of chlorosis.

Otherwise, couldn't be happier with it!

Just be careful with the angle grinders please. I had a fight with one once. 11 stitches, no feeling left in two fingers due to nerves being destroyed.

Growth on all plants doing ok. Chlorosis definitely evident in the spinach, so about 8 capfuls of some iron monosaccharide stuff into the water to help out.

Otherwise, no fish deaths, low ammonia (0.5ppm), nitrites (0.25ppm), nitrates (5-10ppm). pH is 7.6 on normal pH indicator, and 8.2pH on "high pH". Water temp ~ 20-22C.

All fish seem fine..

top effort graffiti!

success story so far.

definately seeing more success stories this year compared to last, good to see.

Just a suggestion Giraffiti, and that is just nip the flowers off the basil and/or trim back to a pair of leaves. This will encourage the plant to bush out and stop it going to seed, which will lengthem its life with you. Of course, if you were picking it all the time for use in the kitchen this will be happening anyway.

Yes I should have clipped them before I flew away - I had transplanted that single thai basil plant into the bed as a bit of an experiment, comparing to the one's in the dirt. I then took a photo, and in the excitement of it all, forgot about the maintenance side of things!

All my tomato plants were doing woeful in the pots/potting mix, so they're all in the bed now.

The best performer thus far, are the 3 broccoli plants on the far side of the standpipe. Literally doubled in size, even though they were planted out in 40C heat.