Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I finally get my media tomorrow. I have been going back & forth on what to use I wanted clay pebbles - nut the price. So I have been saving & looking. I found a great deal online but you have to buy 45 bags. So I did that, this will be enough for my 2 next expansions. The price deal was very good. Normally I can get a 45L bag around here in North Texas for $34.00 If I ordered 45 or more I can get them for $20.95 plus delivery. Only took 4 days to deliver also..
So when they are delivered tomorrow - guess what I will be doing?

I ordered them from: theaquaponicsource.com

Yeah it seems like price has been dropping. I picked up two 50lit bags locally for $25 each recently. My guess is you'll be cleaning that stuff for the next few weeks

I got lazy in a way to clean the clay beads - I filled the beds with the bags put a hose with water streaming in the sump, turned the water off to the fish tanks & started to cycle the beds. But I put another hose in the sump to siphon the water out to my plants outside. let that go for about 3 hours while I watered the plants so no real waist of water.

Helped some what - not is is dirty but not as bad as it would have been

If you dont clean it well prior to putting it in the grow bed a lot of the dusty stuff gets settled at the bottom of the bed. I rince mine 6-7 times before adding it to the system and it still makes the water red/brown and clowdy. The water will clear in a day or so but that stuff is still in the system.