Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Have to about call that cycled HN....

Thanks Rupe, we're pretty excited. now we're waiting to see the response with the plants. I have a feeling they'll be taking off in a week or 2. Well hopefully...

I was looking for seasol here in Hawaii but it is not sold here. Poop. Will look into something else...

What about "Maxicrop"....

+1 for maxicrop.

Look at the nitrates go

I will look into the maxicrop idea. Ebay has it with free shipping to Hawaii. Sweet deal.

Ok so a few questions came up in class today.

--What should the feeding rates and stocking rates be for our systems?
My answer (and please chime in if you have some other ideas or I am flat out wrong): Because there are many variables we should feed and stock to our nutrient levels. Because we are testing everyday we can adjust feeding rates and stocking rates as long as our nutrient levels are OK. If ammonia and nitirites rise too high then we should back off feeding or stock at a lower density.

How does that sound? Or should we actually calculate our stocking and feeding rates to our GB to pond volume?

I also need to have the students monitor DO levels in the pond. I am not too concerned right now because we have a lot of aeration and small fish.

Thanks folks, you guys rock!

HA! Nitrites are ZERO. Ammonia ZERO and Nitrates 20-40. Sweet deal! We also com some tilapia

Thanks folks!

Pics!!

This is a months growth, its growing pretty well, the kids were hoping for faster growth but they are impatient by nature. I've been adding maxicrop (suggested here by rupe and ozzie) and I think its helping. Anyone have a good application rate for maxicrop? How can we get faster growth rates?

Nutes have stabilized around
Ammonia: 0-0.25
Nitrite:0-0.25
Nitrate:20-40 depending on feeding rate.

next semester we'll start running some experiments. Since we have 2 pretty identical systems, we can look at how something like maxicrop affects growth as opposed to no maxicrop.

Already we're seeing how light affects growth. In one system the light was installed higher when seedlings were transferred and this affected the growth and I suspect the veggies will not grow out as well because of it. After some research we found how critical lighting is for young veggies and how it can affect growth even at maturity. We're see this first hand.

Pretty cool stuff.

More pics

Have you thought about putting the system outside, I mean you're in freakin' Hawaii! Look at all that sun going on out there! Are you trying to have a more controlled environment maybe?

Good point Dave. It wasn't intended to have a controlled system, we just wanted to start small and later expand. But its working out great inside because we don't have a single bug on our veggies.

Believe it or not, trying to get the facilities department at our school to approve setting up a system outside is like pulling teeth. Soon I will push harder for it. Sun would help a lot!

And yes we are in freakin Hawaii, makes total sense.

What's your colour spectrum of the lights HN... you wont get optimum growth unless you provide the right, and enough, light at the various stages of growth...

I have 2 plant/aquarium 40W bulbs and 2 cool white 40W bulbs per growbed. Our research said that was a good mixture. Any suggestions? I don't have the specific spectrum or color spectrum with me, I'll post them later.

Question for you all out there. These 2 pictures are of pak choi planted at the same time, in pretty much the same growing conditions. The only difference is one was exposed to more light in the first 3 weeks of growth. So I'm deducting it has to be due to the light, but I am not an expert. What do you guys think is causing one to grow funny?

Probably light. I tried to grow using fluorescents for a awhile and the lettuce etc. got really really tall and skinny. Bought a 400 watt MH grow light off eBay and they grew properly after that. In general the tall pale skinny look is what you get when there isn't enough light.

Bah! I can't afford the MH lights!

durn it!