Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

no , havent done anything yet

the MINT is in one system , just mint , 2 goldfish , bluemetal , 10L bucket and 10L tank . then mint is going absolutely crazy . ALL my garden mint is dying out this time of year , but this mint , in pH 9 water is going crazy . dont know why

The other system , my first proper test system , has got 200L water , 4 fatty koi , 2 GBs ( again , pics earlier on in this thread ) and the plants aint doing anything , theyre just sitting there , not growing , not dying . the nitrates on both system are in the 12 - 20 range from a tertratest kit , but the pH on this 2nd system is about 7.5

my only thought is that the 2 GB system is just not cycled / enough bacteria yet . the top GB has only just been filled & plumbed in , but the GB that was already there has been flooding and draining 8 times a day at 45 minute intervals for 15 minutes each time (2 floods , 2 drains ) . I was expecting more plant growth than this in the existing GB , as its been running for only 2 days less than the mint/bucket system

water looks clear , fish look happy

cant complain too much ( Im just impatient thats all ) because I just checked the existing GB in the main system and theres 3 melon seedling popping out of the hydrotron now ! yay

What are you getting for ammonia and nitrite? These should be spiking if your system is not cycled.
If you have nitrates measuring, and no disasters, you should have a cycled system.
just let the system settle a bit. How young is it?

5 or 6 weeks I think , not really counting

my method of counting time relies on hangovers , not days . its definitely more than 5 weeks , 3 koi have been in there that whole time , and another one added 2 weeks ago

im probably just being impatient , the 3 melon seedlings popping out of the gravel by themselves is a good sign though I suppose - only put the seeds there a week ago

Ahh good. Just watch them grow patiently Boris, I'm sure you'll be fine.

picked this bucket up yesterday ...

woohooo !!

1000L IBC , I can start my second system & hopefully se the first as the fingerling tank or something , until the 5k Litre pond is built next to it

heres the pics

The plan is :

2 105L black plastic pots from B , used as GBs & mounted on TOP of the IBC , against the back and left walls , in an 'L' shape . both flood & drain , filled from a sump

sump is to sit in Front of the IBC on the ground, maybe I can scrounge the top half of an IBc of someone & flip it over to use as a sump , needs to be square and hold atleast 300 litres

suspended Above the sump , an an 'X' shaped cross of metal , with 4 legs will be a blue plastic kiddie pool ( sealed with some sort of sealant ) and that will be the main grow bed .

Once the 2 top (black ) GBs drain into the IBC it will overfill by the 2oo litres necessary to fill the main GB , which will then drain back down into the sump .
I love trying to fit the maximum amount of stuff in small areas like this , its fun mental excersise

so , all of that , plus clad the thing in timber decking , in time to get trout in for winter ? .....

like a bought one

make sure you cover the ibc plastic to slow the degradation from the sun

Yeh , I'll be moving it under the shade before I go down south to drink all the wineries dry . Until Ive got the sump & decking around it , then it'll be safe in the sun

may even coat the whole inside with this black potable-water grade Sikatite stuff that C1 suggested for sealing my pond

That would be overkill boris just need to paint it with a water based paint,
and if it is going to have a deck around it then paint only the top bit exposed to the sun.
Since it is best not to have yr FT in the sun for long periods coating the inside would be- as I said overkill !
Did you checkout the links, the supplier is just down the road from you.

yeah I gave em a call . They dont sell direct , but canning Vale Hardware just around the corner from them will get it in

I meant to call them today but the time got away from me

grrrrr

pump doesnt feel like its up to the job

brand new ,only been running for 4 weeks , rated at 1500L per hour , zero at 2 metres .
for the last 4 weeks its been working fine , the bubble in the little window in the autosyphon / pipe witin pipe takes about 5 minutes out of the 15 minutes fill time to drain , now the pump's decided it doesnt want to work that hard

plus my airstone / bubbler thing crapped itself today

looks like Im hooked on this silly hobby , rather than going down south first thing in the morning to do 3 days of winery tours and relaxing , Im going to be spending tomorrow morning buying a bigger fatter pump and messing around with autosiphons , YAY

Take a trip down to Joels shop Boris.... he'll sort you out with a good pump, plus you can see some working systems and ask a few questions

hmmm

first pump is a "resun King 2A"
Im looking at a Resun King 3 which pushes 2400 lph at zero head and just backing it off with a t-piece & tap so that it doesnt outdo the siphon outflow

Go on a cool day It`s hot under Joel`s tin roof.
By the way when your down south drop in to watershed for lunch you wont be disappointed and if you see the managing director running around mention how good a AP system would be next to his dam.

heh , i'd love to drop into the shop . supposed to be in Margs by 11.00 though ...

so - pickup pump , pickup mate , doubel back , install pump and fidget around with the excess flow tap for an hour ..

drive 3 hours , sit in spa with wine and wonder what the hell my systems doing while im not hovering around it like usual