Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Well guys I finally built the system based on my readings here.

Here are the supplies and the tubes cut for planting holes.


I descided to go with 6" PVC tubing and a air lift pump (later to try a geyser pump). Here is a close-up of the holes, and yes I deburred them from the fine plastic pieces from sawing.


Here is the stand minus two more supporting braces that I added later. I spaced the tubes with 2x4's, so easy.


See how well they are spaced, 12" on center tube to tube.


Here she is loaded down with veggies.


Here is the manifold for grow bed supply water.

I had a quick question about the air lift pump. Would these designs work to make a geyser pump?


I am just really curious, and I would like to get a little more ummph out of my pump.

Oops, I need to find out how to post pictures I guess.

OK, here is the picture from the previously unsuccessful post.

Sorry about the screw up with the pictures. Now I know. I will be better from now on out. You guys advice would be greatly appreciated.

It doesn't look like you need much advice

Whats your plans for supporting your tomatoes and other plants?

Thanks, but I still feel I do... even with basics apparently! I'm a goof. I had my plants for 2 weeks indoors prior to planting, and they were yellowing a couple of days prior to planting. I planted them outside at night and the next two days were very sunny. Cool, but sunny with very light winds. No outside acclimation for the plants "at all" (because I'm a dumba$$, lol). Live and learn, live and learn. The pond is clearing up nicely and fish are doing well. I am amazed how well the airlift pump is doing.



Well, I planned on tomato cages for the squash, toms, cucumbers, melons, and my little Humulus lupulus experiment. From what I read they are great except for their ability to fall over. Very little plant maintenance after installation. Cages should be easy enough to make "not" tip over, especially with many of them connected to each other and a support structure. The other plants shouldn't need anything to thrive, unless I am overlooking something (peppers mostly any way).





Ok, now for my questions for you guys. Am I right, in that a slow trickle of water is what I want? Every time I go digging into the gravel it is wet only a few inches down, which is what you want... right? I am still curious about my geyser drawing, as that would help me with more water if needed. I'm pretty sure that less than a week of recirculating through gravel is not a good enough start as well, for the bacteria to build up. I am off to buy more plants and replant the beds again with veggies, after some more helpful info hopefully. I honestly welcome your criticisms, as they will really help me out.

Things I see right away for you to think about.

1-gravel filled pipes ted to get clogged with roots, especially with large plants like tomatoes.
2-Covering your whole rig with cages might make accessing the plants in the middle kinda difficult.
3-trickle feed through small pipes like that will only give you so much filtration capacity so you will need to limit your fish stocking so as not to over power your system's ability to filter the water (both solids and bio filter.)

Around here most of us know the flood and drain gravel bed filtering capacity and stocking numbers.
Those would be
3 kg of fish per 100 liters of flood and drain media bed or
6 lb of fish per 25 gallons of flood and drain media filled grow bed.

These are grown out sizes for the fish so please don't max out the system with fingerlings and then wonder why the water quality suffers when the fish grow.

How many gallons of gravel do your pipes hold? Now lower the estimation of how much fish that will support because you are not flooding and draining the media but providing a constant trickle which does not wet as evenly and may not let as much air into the areas that do get wet.

Thank you so much for your feedback TCLynx! I am using 52.88 gallons of gravel in the tubes, but you are right about not much touching the water. The roots from the tomatoes were a concern and the cages would be spaced out with the tomatoes. I have peppers in between them and other viney veggies.

How bad am I going to clog up my PVC grow-tubes with tomato roots? I have a open 1-1/4" drain in the end of the tube. Where in my system would you suggest the next batch of veggies be placed? I am reconsidering a Florida Weave type of setup for everything, is that advisable? Also, I am hoping for more information on the geyser-like airlift pump idea or just base information.

I would suggest you add a Flood and drain type gravel filled grow bed that can then feed your tubes. That way you will get heaps more filtration and it will help clean up some of the solid before it can add to your tube clogging. Then you can plant the really big plants into the bed and save the tubes for smaller things like lettuce, strawberries, and perhaps some of the more shallow rooted vines like cucumbers. By the way, basil does very well in NFT pipes.

I would recommend you read Outbackozzie's thread for examples of media filled pipe issues as his first system started out that way. http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2218

Back before I discovered Aquaponics, I did Hydroponics with media filled troughs as modified NFT kinda like what you have set up. The roots do tend to clog up the troughs, I was using wood chips and growing mostly cucumbers and my troughs were less than 5" wide and less than 5" deep.

I have a plastic swimming pool that we thought about filling with gravel as a further biological filter and more bed, but that would require another pump and digging a "lower than pool" sump tank. I might have to consider something like that though. I want a lot of viney stuff like squash and tomotoes, so deeper beds might be a must.

Well, Sunday I finally went to get new plants, since all the others (minus 5-6) had died. I found some really nice ones, but they were quite a bit more than I expected for just one plant in some cases. Tomatoes and more yellow and green squash for the most part, but I also found nice habanero and tabasco plants. Now, my plants all look nice and no worries of shock. They drooped yesterday during the hottest part of the day, but once revived by a glass of pond water they perked right back up.

Then, I noticed my fish all swimming on the surface trying to breathe. Thank God I had all the stuff to finish the final bio-filter and aeration unit. These fish were on the verge, I feel. They haven't been eating except on rare occasion, so I have been worried. The grow-tubes haven't had a heavy enough flow of water/plants to chemically change/remove nitrates. So, I feared a rise in the pond's ammonia and nitrite levels. I hurried and built a really cool biological filtration unit.

Because of the need for a little more water in my grow-tubes, I have tinkered around with crafting a "geyser pump." Well, that may have changed yesterday. I have all the parts for the geyser tests, but this next project was just so simple when it hit me.

I wanted to build another bio-filter, but I did not like the idea of dumping all the rocks on top of my garden fountain pump. I didn't have a hole saw, drill, or anything else with the exception of my Scout knife. I looked at the pump, which had a bulkhead fitting staring at my face, and thought VIOLA!!! I will cut a hole just big enough for the threads, put the pump on the outside of the lid, and thread down the protection screen as a bulkhead fitting. Now I could cut slits in the bottom of the bucket, and fill the bucket completely with gravel. I left a depression in the gravel just big enough for the lid to be able to smash and lock down. The bucket was a 5 gallon like HD or Lowes with locking lid w/ o-ring. I sunk the bucket in the pond, threaded on my garden hose adaptor fitting extra-hose (from when I stripped it for a mash screen for brewing), and added a Nylon 1/2" nipple X 1/2" threaded fitting to the end of the mess. I did this to later add a threaded "Y," and "V" the water in two directions (one into the pond to clean and circulate, and one into the supply line for feeding the grow-tubes).

While trying this newly completed contraption, it wouldn't stay waited down and kept rising to squirt water out of the pond. It also had little to no aeration for something so powerful, so I thought "Venturi device." Wouldn't you know it, the 3/4" X 1/2" "T" slips right over the hex on the Nylon nipple. This allows me now to use 6" of 1/2" tubing as my air inlet, and as a weight holding down the spray-rise at the end of the hose. Plugged it in and man are those fish happy. Tons of aeration, motion, filtration. Now, to hook it to the beds. Me thinks a ball valve is in order for the feed supply to the beds, this pump is pretty powerful.

Can't wait, I will take pictures and post more stuff later on. Looking out my window right now, everything is A-OK!

Here she is as of today. This first one is of the new in-pond bio-filter that I made. Basically, it's a bucket filled with gravel and slits in the bottom with pump attached to the lid, and it has a Venturi device for aeration.


Watch it go! 300 GPH pump attached is really cycling the water. Lots of air in there!


Here's a little wider shot!


Here's two of the whole garden.



Here's the power box with all the connections to protect them from rain.


Check out the new growth on the survivors! Wow, I'm surprised they are still with us.



Hope you guys are enjoying the project as much as I am.